GRIMSLEY: GYPSUM IN KANSAS. LQ 
frame shed on the east bank of the river, below the town. In an 
iron kettle, which held about five barrels and which was heated by 
a stove, they commenced the manufacture of plaster of Paris. 
Progperity seems to have attended their work, for in 1875 a stone 
mill was built by Coon & Son on the west side of the river and the 
water power of the river was now used for grinding. This mill 1s 
now standing, a monument to the commencement of a great Kan- 
Sas industry. The town, for purpose of encouragement of the new 
departure, granted them the north half of their reservation, des- 
cribed as extending from a point at the middle of the outcrop and 
thence north. This mill was operated for nearly twelve years and 
then the firm unfortunately failed. The mill property and the 
gypsum grant of fifty robs of outcrop and twenty rods back in the 
hill, came into the hands of Mr. Sweetland, a business man of 
Blue Rapids. It was leased to several parties and the mill was run 
to the year 1889, when the flood caused considerable damage re- 
sulting in the abandonment of the mill. 
Mr. Hayden, of New York, in 1887 bought the remaining portion 
of the old reservation and the adjoining Robinson farm. Fowler 
Brothers bought the farm back of the Sweetland twenty rods limit. 
The earlier mining was done by stripping the cover of dirt and 
shales, and the rock was hauled in wagons to the mill. Later it 
was brought down the river in flat boats, drawn by a small steam 
tug. 
In 1887 the Fowlers formed the Blue Rapids Plaster Company 
and built a one and one-half story frame mill of one kettle capacity 
on the west side of the river at edge of town. The present entry 
to their mine ig fifteen feet above the water level, though the gyp- 
snm bed rock is the bed rock of the river, which is four feet deep 
at this place.’ The entry runs east about 350 feet and the gypsum 
dips west toward the river. Five men are employed ai the mine, 
and the rock ig hauled out and up an incline to the railroad where 
a twenty-five ton car is loaded in two days and hauled to the mill. 
The gypsum o¢curs as a gray, mottled rock, with sugary texture, 
breaking with irregular fracture. The top consists of a layer of 
white selenite needles forming satin spar, with a thickness of one- 
fourth to one and three-fourth inches. Throughout the mine are 
numerous cutters, in which are found perfect, transparent crystals 
of gypsum, usually of small size. 
