The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-09-26
MONTE CRISTO MIXES.
Story Of Their Discovery By Joe
PearSall.
A FOURTH OF JULY FIND


Luck OF . PIucky Prospector-How the
District Came to Be Named-Tne
re Cabin.
MONTE .CRIsTo, Sept. Especial. i
When you come to Monte Cristo 2 will
not be many evenings when, sitting
around the fire, they will tell you the
wonderful story of man and a felc. glass
on mountain high, and afar, against an
other mountain side, 8 broad, boltE ledge
cleaning like burnt-red gold in thr sun;
OF how human goat climbed overpreci-
pieces and chasms where no humatl foot
had ever trod; of perils and privstions,
and finally of locations that began at the
headwaters of an unknown stream. And
from this strange conjunction of ths man
and the field glass and the sunlight they
will tell you came the discovery Of sfonte
Cristo's wealth that was not born In a
dreaming novelist's brain.
Joe Pearsalf's foot was the first to scale
the rugged barriers that inclose il and
climb down into this valley, now resonant
with the sawmilis sonorous charft, the
hum of hammers and at intervals the
cannonade from the mine tunnels mouths.
That was three years ago, and then It was
solitude as wild, majestic and unbroken
as anything in the middle course q the
Andes. Pearsall had been prospecting
then for ten years or more without find
ing much of anything-"went broke. you
know, oh, hundreds of times" he says
now with laugh. Hadn't streck a
thing. But all a man wants to do us to
keep at it! Sure to strike it some time.
Sure as fate"
In this quick. short, sententioua way
talks this thin, keen. smiling-faced- man
to whom the long years, varied of every
vicissitude, have brought at last ting un.
conditioned coin of success. The gears
haven't "phased" him, not whit; to-day,
as ten years ago, the same-spare, ressless,
eager, daunted at nothing, with cg1ick,
catchy laugh and small, snappy beadlblue
eyes, only his face grown scanned and
tanned like leather, hearty and generous,
the friend of everybody, a great character
Joel He quit the pedagogic rod fog the
pick about the time of the later big lead.
vile excitement, along in '7S, vines the
town had in it $1,000 people. 1900 of
which was sheer floating popula1ion.
Then it took three hours to reach the post
office. thousand men in line all day. and
men paid a "fiyer" fast enough for rood
place up toward the front.
Pearsall had clambered around Colorado
and Idaho, and later in Idaho, for GOOD
ten years, and as he puts it, "hadn't found
a thing worth shucks, but leaving behind
him wherever he went recollections OF his
exploits and daring climbs and places for
the oldest inhabitant to point to.
When Pearsall struck Silver creek along
in 1889, its aurora borealis boom was Just
beginning to fade, and it was not very
long before he "went broke" 1t hap
pened one day that when out prospecting
he saw through his field glass q GLORIOUS
big red stain away to the north. 1t Didn't
look very easy to get to, and it VAST
probably that was the reason why Pear
sail took grub stake and went ovet to
make its acquaintance. When he REACHED
the divide which parts the Silver Geek
district from Monte Cristo, he saw not>one
but two of these red-stain lodges, Nay
across wide basin. The ledge he saw
miles away, with the field glass, is known
as the Monte Cristo. 1t was near the sam
high ridge which terminates in Wiln.ans
peak. Half a mile back was anotaer.
easier of access, and this he struck Tor.
He climbed round the rim of the bas in,
over the big glacier, and down to the cut
crop. 1t was literally broad road Of ere,
twenty to thirty feet wide, running .up
the face of the ridge. Planting shis
claim stakes, the patriotic prospeSto
called it in honor of the Say
Of its discovery and Location,
independence Of 1776." The 4th OF al (, it
subsequently became apparent, is Pear
Sails red-Ietter day. He has made
strikes" every returning 4th of JAly
since. Carefully concealing his secret an
derneath his bland smile, Pearsall W. pt
back to Seattle and there met J. NJ. E~il-
mans, then out looking over the county,.
The reader may have heard how thee
years back the lead in the Woodside mssle
at Park City. Utah, was lost and the me,e
abandoned; how a shrewd mining ~ .n
came and looked over the property. fotAd
the lead again, leased the mine, and hoA q
few months later it was announced tat
the Wilmans Bros, lessees, had taken Mt
S625,O00 from the new drift. j. NJ. " j.
mans was out in Washington looking fox "a
now lead. When he learned of PearsaA s
find F. w. Wiimans, president Of the CT i
pany, was telegraphed fr and came ga
The new district was visited apd mine p
cations made. The next thing was TO y id
out what river it was that headed in / is
basin where the mines were found. 1:ae
first locations described the district {-at
the headwaters of an unknown stream
The party that came over the diy(9ie
late IN September comprised F. W. and J.
N. Wilmans. Joe Pearsall and George
Peabody. The locations made, Pearssll
and companion struck off down the
unknown stream" 10 trace it to u1e
Columbia or the Sound. Wading. swim
ming. cutting through the wild tanglezof
underbrush and debris, through Z typical
Western Washington jungle, at last t5ie
last rasher and cornpone gone, half starved
and half dead, and clothes torn almost CT
they reached Rsiker's. nine miles aboge
Sank City. They had been six days max
ing matter OF thirty-six or thirty-seven
miles. But they had located the new DIS