The Warner weekly sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1885, 1883-12-07
Gold and Silver Dust.
Philadelphia News.

Gold and Silver Dust.
Philadelphia News.
There are houses in this city, plain
looking from without, but with roofs in
crusted with precious metals, and floors
| studded with silver, gold and diamonds.
There are CobWebs hanging from the
ceilings, but they are sprinkled like the
spangled lace of an oriental bride. The
men and in the house are i'll
dressed and grimy, but their fingers are
dipped with gold, and their hair is dust
ed with glittering ores. With all their
riches, however, such houses are only
greasy shops, with rickety, dark stair
| WAYS. A reporter of the News climbed
| three flight in e He entered a room
! whence be might hav3 been sent away
! well off for life; but all he received was
a choking Whit O. suphuriC acid or some
other acid, and all he saw and felt was a
furnace which a number Of wOrkmen
were supplying with pits of an old floor.
The ashes were being sCraped into bar
rels.
"Making pulverised charcoal Tor bill
iOus peOple?" asked the reporter.
mo, sir; just burning some precious
! wood" was the answer. "You see,
when we moved from our old quarters
in the Peterson building we brought the
old floor with us and left a new one. l
! expect these bits Of irewood to yield us
up ward OF 5000. The floor has been in
use about ten years, and, grain by grain,
it has been filed with costly metals. This
charcoal will be ground in a mill, and
thence will go into a cruCible for amalga-
nation with mercury. By squeezing out
the mercury through channels skins we
will regain the gold and silver that has
been ground into the floor by hundreds
OF feet"
What becomes of the metal dust that
is swept ID?"
we treat it in a similar way. Our
employees are required to wash their
hands in a tank, and the dirty water
passes through a series of sieves before
reaching the waste pipe, so that very
little of value is allowed to escape. A
Newark firm uses no less than FIVE tanks
for its refuse water before it passes into
a we'll, A few years ago the 6rm took
out the mud from the bottom ofthe well,
worked it, and obtained several
hundred dollars of metal. The sweep
ings and settings of a shop like ours are
worth from 5000 to $4,000, according
to the kind of work done. If we get up
many diamond settings and plain rings
the waste is large. In chain making and
watch case work the loss is not so great"
"What is the value of a floor?"
That is hard to estimate. Dorlson 81
AGE of Newark burnt a floor 50x100 and
obtained a return of $1,000. A jewelry
establishment on SAMSON street obtained
| $50 for Que recently burnt"
Cannot the workmen carry away the
gold dust with out detectiOn?"
Il have heard of such things. We
had a man in n employ who bad cur
lY hair and was continually running his
fingers through it. On inquiry we found
ne had been discharged from a New
York factory for carrying gold away in
his hair, which was afterwards re-
deemed by a fine tooth comb in a way
many q mother redeems her boys
scalp"
At this i%uncture another lot of the pre-
cious kindling was put in the furnace.
! The scribe busted off his note book,
shook the lapel of his coat, looked hon
est, held up his hands and had his fin
ger nails inspected, and left as poor as
he came.
1--WE do not reduce our sweepings, !"
said another ieWeler. "We take oul
sweepings, burn them and ~pulverize
them, and send out sample packages to
the asSayer. The value of ~sweepings
yearly / should estimate at ove $500"
At the United States mint, where
more gold is used than in any other
manufacturing place in the country, the
devices used { recover vagrant parti-
cles of gold and silver are both novel
and interesting. CHIEF Clerk l.. r. Cop
perwaithe said: The value ofour sweep.
ings for the fiscal year ending June &c
was $I4,2 O4.40 gold, and $9,320.12 for sill
yer. We are very careful TO reclaim al
the gold we can. Nearly every month
we have the roofs of all our buildings
swept and the s%weepings refined"
docs that pay you to sweep the
roofs?"
"Pay usl The sweepings for one
month amounted 5000. We occasionally
sweep the roof OF the Presbyterian
Church. You wouldn't expect to tinc
gold in a sewer, would your Well. We
scraped about fifty feet of the stree
sewer, aud, apart from the rats We
caught, reclaimed $500 worth of gold ant
silver that had been washed from th,
roof of the building during heavy show
ers."
"How often do you scrape the sewer?'
"Well, We shall scrape again soon
But after that there will be no need
We are having a well dug to catch on
rain-water in the future. We had a sur
plus last year Of * ounces Of gold owe.
the amount allowed for waste"
How do you guard against your work
men carrying gold away?"
ssThe workmen leave their workin,
clothes here, and they are washed from
k;cno - <;roaU