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Good afternoon everyone.

I guess I've become what I hoped and prayed I wouldn't. Daja vu is something we all seem to experence over so often. I've had my few. You question yourself, have I been in the heat to much?, do I want it so badly that it seems to appear?.

Well these are questions best talked about over a campfire and a cold beer.

But I do need some help from all you Colorado boys & girls. I have a picture that was taken in 1993 during a visit to Cripple Creek & Victor. I would like to know the name of the mine if possible or the company that own it. Thats a tall order that will be discussed in depth at Greaterville or our next Gold Basin trip.

This does mean alot to me so any help would be helpfull.

PS: I didn't want this to be a big downer so I added a piece of ore that came out of the 300 foot level of a friends mine.

The 29 Prospector

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29er,

"WHO are we?"...WE IS PROSPECTORS,We is MDing hound dogs.......we is creatures placed here by societys demand.(well kinda)......we is NOT properly using The English Language...(well........at least today we is not).

"Dajavu"!!!!!! ...I think I heard of that befo som where's.Bob,Ever hear about the the reversed version of Daja vu?...Ja vuda is where ya flashback on something AFTERWORDS....ie;You see a nugget in a dream AFTER ya ACTUALLY saw it the day before! JA VU DA!

Bob.......were the 60's good to you?LOL!

Thanks for the pics bud!

BIGFOOOOOOOOT

yep.bmp

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Hi 29,

Your right, that is a tall order. There are many, many mines in that area. As you probably know some of them can be seen from the road from Victor to Cripple Creek and many more back in the hills that cannot not be seen from the road.

Its been a lot of years since I have been up to that area and have probably forgot a lot about it.

Was the mine close to Victor or was it close to Cripple Ck.?

It may also help if you had the name of the mountain, hill or gulch that it was on/in.

It has been estimated that there were over 400 shipping mines in that area.

Some of the hills and mountains were Gold, Globe, Tenderfoot, Mineral, Carbonate, Frink, Raven, Ironclad and Beacon and Battle mountain, Big Bull, and Squaw mountain, Grouse and Straub mountain to name a few.

There is also many a gulch both named and unnamed like Poverty Gulch, Arequa, and Squaw Gulch.

Don't know if any of these will ring a bell or not but maybe it will help a bit.

I have many topo maps, but don't think I have any of that area as I never did any work up there other than just running around looking at things. But will check to see.

Bob T.

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Hi Bob, the Strong and Ajax mines are but only a beginning. There are too many to try and list. I was in the Cripple Creek Victor district in the late 90's I believe it was. I have a book called the" Cities of Gold " which was written on the Victor, Cripple Creek mining district. I hope this helps you Brother. If you need any more let me know. God Bless Bob and that is a really neat area !

John Tomlinson, your buddy :D

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Bigfoot,

Thank you my man for the neat pic. ;) Oh and by the way, the 60's started out ok with graduation, a vacation in the orient :P:P , and end in such a haze that 66-70 I just can't remember much. Of course that could be old age now. :lol:

Bob

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Bob T,

I pretty sure that it was more toward the Victor end. We left CC and were taking the general tourest trip, at least that is what Dale called it,the nine could be seen from the road. I believe that he said that it was part of the Vindator series of mines and 38 men died in this mine, all were recovered but 2. All I have to go on are brass tags 36 & 38. It is very beautify country and the ore is something else.

Bob

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John,

Thanks for the help, I'll try to find a copy of it somewhere. I have a copy of a book called" The forgoten men of Cripple Creek" by Les Spell. He goes into the people that were on the sidelines, not the players.

Thank you sir and blessings to all.

----------------------------------------

To all who have answered.... Thanks, Blessings on all your endeavors.

Old 29

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Bob,

Your request begs of many questions. Was the mine in operation during your visit? Were you closer to Victor or Cripple Creek. Do you remember the last town i.e. Stratton, Independence, Anaconda, Goldfield that you passed through?

Since it appears that you are on a road above looking down on the mine, there are only a few places (at least on the 'two dollar' :lol: tours) where this could occur and the Vindicator Mine is one of them. The others are the Ajax, Elkton, Portland/Independence and Golden Cycle.

Also to the best of my knowledge the Cresson Mine was still being worked and producing in the 90's but it doesen't fit the scenario here.

The Vindicator Mine isn't far from the town of Independence. During the labor troubles of the time the train station in Independence was blown up, a number of miners from the Findlay mine lost their lives. Another explosion took the lives of two more at the Vindicator during this same time frame.

Hope this helps, this entire area has one heck of a history!

Gary

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Bob,

Your request begs of many questions. Was the mine in operation during your visit? Were you closer to Victor or Cripple Creek. Do you remember the last town i.e. Stratton, Independence, Anaconda, Goldfield that you passed through?

Since it appears that you are on a road above looking down on the mine, there are only a few places (at least on the 'two dollar' :lol: tours) where this could occur and the Vindicator Mine is one of them. The others are the Ajax, Elkton, Portland/Independence and Golden Cycle.

Also to the best of my knowledge the Cresson Mine was still being worked and producing in the 90's but it doesen't fit the scenario here.

The Vindicator Mine isn't far from the town of Independence. During the labor troubles of the time the train station in Independence was blown up, a number of miners from the Findlay mine lost their lives. Another explosion took the lives of two more at the Vindicator during this same time frame.

Hope this helps, this entire area has one heck of a history!

Gary

Gary,

Your so right on the money. It was the Vindiactor Mine. From what I have grathered today 2 were killled at the mine whose's brass tags were #38 & #36. So far no names.

29

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Yo 29,

There were many large mines up there. On that six mile stretch of road you are hardly ever out of sight of large workings.

Two of the greatest mines near Victor were the Portland and the Independence. The Cresson was not the oldest mine but was one of the larger ones with very rich ore. Not long after the Cresson was opened a chimney of gold was discovered and a vug of high-grade ore was opened. It is claimed the Cresson was gold all through and was paying $400,000 a year in dividends.

When you leave Victor and go up past the Portland and Ajax properties and on up the hill toward Altman you can look down on the big dump and buildings at the Vindicator mine.

The ore trains had a switching place below the Vindicator dump over near the Golden Cycle property. You can see this if you drive up on Battle Mountain.

A lot of these mines were actually around the gold town of Goldfield, just a hop from Victor. They were the Victor, the Vindicator, Golden Cycle, Inedpendence, the Findlay and the Hull City Placer. The Vindicator shipped 20,000 tons of ore a year and close to it was Hull City Placer, which was the cause of the town of Independence to spring up in 1895.

There was a large project called the Roosevelt Drainage tunnel that was completed in 1910. Since the deeper levels of the mines had water in them and could not be worked the tunnel was built to drain a number of the mines. Laterals were later run to tap various hills, so that by 1914 the general water level of the district had ben lowered about 700 feet vertically. The mines continued to dig until they were below the level of the tunnel and water collected in the deep shafts of these mines.

To cut the cost of pumping the Golden Cycle Co. decided to bore a new and deeper drainage tunnel, known as the Carlton tunnel, which would connect with the Portland shaft and ultimately with the Cresson, Ajax and the Vindicator mines. It was a seven mile bore that cost $1,500,000 and was completed in 1941 and in less than two days the properties tapped were dry.

There were some placer areas in 1892 and that is how the area was started a year before the lode mines were discovered.

As was said before, there was an explosion at the Vindicator and two miners were killed. But there were also many more killed during the labor problems of that time.

There is a lot of history in that area. Hope this will help you a bit.

Bob T.

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Hey Colorado,

Sounds to me from the above post that you happen to own some of the same great reading material as myself, 'Stampede to Timberline' by Muriel Sibell Wolle B) . I have the June of 74 edition. Many bookmarks and a few dog-eared pages.

Great reference material and one heck of a read, Im still not finished :lol:

Gary

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The Jack Pott mine was also in the area, and the cave of gold was right there in Victor. There are so many mines there and around that has fabulously rich ore with metallic gold right in plain sight. You should look for a few books by Duane Smith. I have one that profiles a lot of the gold areas, but don't recall the name right off hand- I'll look around and post it later

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Gentlemen,

Thank all of you for the help. This area means a lot to me for reasons that can not explained on line. When we first moved to 29 Plams, our naeibor was Les Spell who grew up in Cripple Creek. He was one of many that exported out of town by train during the labor wars. Also Roy Sherman lived out here, but didn't talk much about Cripple Creek. My friend Dale Weaver whom we visited when we went back has since sold his property to the big mining company there. He owned the Hiawhia(sp) Mine.

Thanks........... 29

Bob T, We must get together sometime and brainstorm about this. Of course we won't be worth much for a couples afterwards..

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Bigfoot,

Dale has to roast his ore in his wood stove to remove the binding agent holding the gold in. He would roast it at 350 degrees for 2-3 days and that is the out come. I'll attach a piece of the ore prior to roasting and a picture of Dale's roasting oven. He later bought to pizza ovens from Chuckie-cheese and hooked them up in tamtum and slow roasted the ore from the ovens on to a converer to the jaw crusher. I don't fully understand the matrax of the districts ore maybe Chris can help out.

Bob

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Hey 29,

Wouldn't mind bumping gums with you sometime. Thought about swinging by the last time I was through there but was kind of pushed for time.

Now on second thought I have a really tough time finding a shovel that will fit my hands, the handle is either to fat or to thin or to long or to short. After looking at some of the photos of your hand tools, you are probably the one who would come up with something that would just about fit. :rolleyes::lol:

Things are begining to get a little tight over here. We lost some good ground when they expanded the Indian Res., and now with the price of gold, there are claims everywhere. Seems everyone thinks that they are going to make their fortune. I know some of the area is not worth the time it takes to put paper on it.

Gotgold,

Yup, I have the book Stampede to Timberline. Good info and history on some of the old mining towns and mines. Don't really know of anyother way to gather info and history unless we read about it or hear about it by hand-me-down word of mouth, since most of us are not old enough to have worked in or around the mines and camps of bygone days.

Another book that I had was Jeep Trails to Colorado Ghost Towns, as well as Ghost Towns of the Colorado Rockies.

Guess the one I like best is Colorado Ghost Towns and Mining Camps. Not a huge amount of history but hundreds of remote and little known towns and mining camps.

Used to placer a bit in an area between Buena Vista and Leadville also worked some of the tributaries off Independence as well as Chalk Creek Canyon, which leads up to the old towns of St. Elmo, Romley, Hancock and Tincup. From Hancock you can go on up to the Alpine tunnel, but don't know if the road is still open. Also worked Ruby Mountain north of there, not for gold but garnets, just kind of a passtime thing.

Lived in the Ouray-Red Mountain-Telluride area, lots of old camps and towns with hundreds of mines in the area. Had claims on the San Miguel River,below Telluride, the river carried a lot of fine gold with the high

benches carrying coarse gold, [ancient river bed].

Lived in Pagosa Springs for a few years, not much in the way of gold there but over the hill is Summitville with a number of hardrock mines as well as some placer that produced nice nuggets.

If your east-bound and hang a left at Southfork you will go to Creede, many many mines and old camps and if you continue on over the hill you will come out in Lake City, another mining town but far from a ghost town. Lake City has some great fourth of July activities & a great place to visit [in the summer].

Don't know if anyone ever heard of Alfred Packer or not, he was from Lake City, and was a cannibal. Seems that he and his partners got snowed in one winter and he eat his partners.

One day I was in a shop in Ouray and while looking at some books, the title of a recipe book caught my attention, the title was ALFRED PACKERS cook book.

One other book that is a real head-scratcher. THE SCARLET SHADOW by Walter Hurt, a story of the great colorado conspiracy.

Bob T.

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Hey that blue looking rock sort of looks like Silverton area silver/lead/gold ore. A large percentage of ore in colorado is sulphide, the reason it has to be roasted before value extraction. While placers do exist in the San Juans, finding them can be a problem, and the weather extremes a bigger problem.

Water percolation over sulphide ore creates sulfuric acid, and the more a mine was developed, the more rain, snowmelt, and water cavities opened and drained via the mine. In the San Juans, there were mines where the iron pipes changed on one shift, were completely eaten up in as little as a day. The iron wheels on a mine cart were consumed; bolts, rail, any sort of relic- all sort of melting into the landscape. rotten wood and dangerous portals. It seems that other areas completely escaped the sulfur ore. though cripple creek and victor are in the upper reaches of a volcanic crater and its ore was pretty much a natural oxidized leachate in the surface bodies, becoming more sulphide in the deeper portions, and certainly below the water line.

There were probably more ghost towns and mining camps in colorado than in most of the rest of the west combined. Colorado was the last of the states to pass any sort of workman comp, doing so in 1930's (Utah was the first state to protect miners with WC), and every miner was expected to deal with any injury or mishap, having full knowledge of the dangers of mining and still entering into a mine to work. Didn't want to go to work? Colorado sent out the state militia and made the miners mine, or get shot dead.

Taking a trip to CO? get a 4x4 and tour the country around Silverton, Ouray, Lake City, Engineer's pass, and Creede. Get some good boots and some toilet paper (for the nosebleeds) as the mines are regularly up in the hills 10,000- 14,000 feet above sea level, following a burro trail. the bunkhouses were generally at the top of the mine, and built on stilts, with sheer dropoffs. Just getting to one mine, say the gladstone and emma vein, will put you in great physical shape, provided you push yourself all the way to the end of the trail.

There are a lot of mines with really good ore still available, but the tree huggers have shit and closed the mines. Idarado is one of them. When pushing towards Ouray, you will notice the highway is on an overhang of rock, maybe a 1000 feet freefall should you run off. That stretch was part of the railroad (otto meers?) bed that was the final leg of the narrow gauge built to within a few miles of ouray. You can't excatly stop anywhere and look over the edge. It is a wonder the road hasn't fallen off. . . ... . great views but at a price. winter most any time, anywhere, in the mountains, and cold water trickling down inside an already freezing drift. My wife said they should put a guardrail or something on the road to keep the cars from running off. heck there wasn't enough space for dirt or a post hole to anchor a guardrail in the Ucompagre mountain pass

nuff said take a trip and explore it for yourself

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Bigfoot, Bob T., Wirechief, gotgold, Hammer, Whats4supper, to all of you I say thank you. Maybe Greaterville or Gold Basin we can all come together and really have a discussion. There is a book out by Les Spell called "The Forgeten Men of Cripple Creek". He doesn't go into the mines much but instead wrote the founding history by the unknowns. Les's father was the sheriff of Cripple Creek. Les does mention the labor wars and the fact that he was arrested and put on the train and told they would shot him on sit if he came back. Les's family moved to florssant for awhile, about 6 years, and then followed Les to San Bernardino. Les came on out to 29 Palms, invited by Isler & Ingelsal and helped them bring the Gypsy Queen and the Maria into production. He later became the mine safety inspector, worked at the Gold Crown same time my father did, and took over the safety of the supply. He later worked at the Virginia Dale til the ore faulted and they couldn't find it. Isler and company gave Les the Gypsy Queen, The Maria and the Cowhorn(aka the Joel). Les did assessment work only on the Maria and Joel, his passion was the Gypsy Queen.

Sorry guys, got off subject. My wife and I spent 3 summers traveling all thru Colorado. We saw mines that I swear you need a sky hook to get to them and creeks no more 2 foot wide 1 foot deep and so cold it would instantly freeze your throat.

To all who have not had the prividge to travel, walk, and stay a day or two, PUT IT ON YOUR LIST, you will not be sorry.

The old 29'er

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