Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1875-09-23
COLORADO.
GEORGETOWN, COL, Sept. IL, 1915.

her bUrderS-but nUT she taxes SIel
in another direction, and by purchase
of a silver lode here will endeavor I,
add silver to her gold and greenbaci
accumulationS. / was up to-day OF
Saxon Mountain to examine the pur
chase made by some Of your Bellsfr'
citizens. and find it well-dehned anC
developed lode, carrying large amount
of rich ore. Ii took nearly three hour:
Of hardest climbing to reach the sum
NIT, where the lode is located, foT it il
more than 20G0 feet above the city, bu
when there was greatly gratified at tht
undObted exhibition Of rich ore and the
promising prospects the purchaser!
have before them fer reaping reward
for their venture. | went down In The
shafts and fonnd the miners taking ou
ore which ill give mill run, or viii
smell out, from 5000 to $1,000 per ton
In other places Whera the lode ha'
been barred or exposed by tile Gle
mentS, the ore crops out, showing I
value equal to one-half OF the above
and on every hand are indisputable ev
licences of richness and general worth
of the mine. do not doubt 1t can ot
made truly profitable under careful
cautious aDd prudent management
But Judging the enterprise by the
mass Of investments here, | would sag
it will necessarily fail, nine out OF ten,
or rather forty-nine out of fifty Eastern
companies embarking in silver and
gold mining in Colorado fail. The mi.
ninS regions are covered all over with
deserted and abandoned mills, smeit.
ing furnaces, engines and other mining
appliances, costing the owners in the
aggregate millions ofdollars, the whole
an entire loss, and yet in the main'
these losses and failures have no excuse
as Offset for the terrible bluuders caus-
| ing them. There is little difference be-
tween silver mining and your legiti-
mate iron business. Both require cap
ital, and above all, the proper business
ability to success, TO fully conduct and
control all the various interests involv-
ed. But each Eastern Silver Company,
as rule, has an aunt or cousin, or
nephew, or fossil, or y Y q, or other
unknown quantity, utterly worthless
for business purposes at home, who
must he provided for by the company,
! with the most responsible position in
its gift, that of superintendent. Out
they come, and invariably they have
more knowledge of mining and all its
processes than any miner, and rush at
once intO expenditures, which no ex-
perienccd person would dream of in
curing, and which sooner or later
bring ruin upon the company, or dis
gust that results in abandonment. The
careful, shrewd and conservative su-
perintendent, that would take time to
learn the most approved processes OF
taking out ore, and would incline to
move slowly, is never selected, be-
cause he is never half so wise, nor cal
cuIated to make the stockholders rich
at stroke, as some bit OF protege,
who knows all about mining before he
learns what lode really is, and who
beside, would not at home, be trusted
to sell, upon his own responsibility, a
pound of soap by any individual mem
Der Of the company. Take the Terri
BILE Cornpany-its old and experienced
employees netted it rom the third class
ore over $65, 600 last year. Thi. year,
however, it removed every one, and
substituted men wholly inexperienced,
who will not realize thousand dollars
profit. So elsewhere. The most mex
piicable and inexcusabIe expenditures,
involving ruin always, result as a rule
from one Eastern com pany's sending
out superintendent unfit at home for
business purposes, and still more unfit
here. / have seen men here, not three
weeks from the States, who were wi
ser in their conceit than old miners, by
twenty years of experience, and yet
entrusted with the pecuniary interests
Ofa company.
L loI -, ha1 I,rI,- 1T
future before it, inasmuch as it has a
most valuable property. But it will
find the difference between profit and
loss lies in the man put in its charge,
and if it undertakes to carry out the
general rule of providing for some one
who at home is unfit for responsible
position, it might as we'll write failure
upon its books as the preliminary step.
There is truly right and a wrong way
in silver mining, and the one who falls
into the right is he who 10 willing to
proceed cautiously, and who, above all
things, will not act upon the great
knowledge which all the inexperienced
and beginners feel they have when first
undertaking to work silver mines. [
do not certainly wish to discourage any
one in the States from silver mininS,
but merely to point out the shoals on
which so many corporations wreck
their enterprises; and | do Say as a re-
suit of extensive observation that the
most dangerous Of all is that given by
the rash, inexperienced superintendent
who ignores the experience and Gus
tom OF old miners.
In company with Mr.. Shupc, of Bell
aire, l went up to the SUNNI: of Gray's
Peak, and was charmed by the mag
nifcent view it afforded. 1t, height,
over $4,000 feet, placed 1t above the
mountains, and enshled
the eye to take in Il scope of country
hundreds of miles in extent. The
Mount of the Holy Cross stood out in
bold prominence, with It's distinctive
emblem OF the Cross, from which it
takes its name. This is formed by
deep ravines, alway. filled with snow,
whose relative position to each other is
such as alta distance to give the form OF
a cross to the boholder. Pixies Peak, Of
same height as Gray's, loomed up
against the horizon, a hundred miles
away. For granduer and sublimity
of view, no mountain in our country
excels Gray's Peak. We had to strug-
gle up to the summit through pelting,
driving snow storm, which struck us as
we emerged from the low stunted pines
and bushes at timber line, and then as
we climbed upwards 1000 feet higher,
it often seemed we would have to turn
back so fiercely did the snow battle
against US. Once at the summit, the
clouds gave way to the bright sun, and
for an hour we had our opportunity to
gaze upon Natures panorama, which
lay spread around and about us for
hundreds of miles. Another, snow
storm, however, came up, and drove
Il. down to the timber, and from that
back to Georgetown we had pleasant
ride in the sunshine. a snow storm
in August was an anSSnoly to both of