St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1896-01-24
THE CREEPING CLAY.
A TREMENDOUS FORCE MANIFEST IN
THE CoMSToCK MINES.


Four Inches In a Few Years.
~ ,i,,o :, +ho world
Ane'o 10 O"v Wv .i l''',o .,o nat,,,,I
that Has ever Niio" = ''i'0u7" - -
action OF It's drllC now 'holousniV -"
ture can compress wood ana lh"O mine
is the old Consolidated III inc ColhsIocA
lode, "Jim Fairs Pet, and the mine
that holds the record for quartz ore. In
half dozen offices in this city there are
small slabs A by 10 inches that have for
some time puzzled workers in wood
Every time man who knows anything
about wood comes into one of these OF
fees he is shown one of these slabs and
asked to say what kind OF wood 1t IS
AS rule he shutters and stammers and
hesitates, and is lost. 1t has the princl-
pal properties of so many different kinds
of wood that he does not know just
what forest should be blamed for Its
birth. AS fact it is Sierra Nevada
pine, and its compression is due to the
fact that several million tons OF super
huous earth have been pressing upon 1t,
although not for any very long time,
with so great force that pieces OF
wood II inches square have been com
pressed into A inches i'll width, and
the fibers SO closely crowded together
that when polished it seems much more
like stone than wood.
All the history of the Comstock lode'
governed and regulated as 1T always has
been by men in San Francisco, is pecul
lar, but Of all the stories in the mines
on this lode there is none more peculiar
than the "creeping clay" and the COM
pressed timbers. From 1874 until 1877
the Big Bonanza was worked down to a
1900 foot level, but at /, 100 feet they
stopped for awhile and concluded to
drift off to the east. This brought them
to position where large proportion
of side Of mountain was pressing
upon the quartz bed. There was a body
Of orc, shaped like watermelon and
in size equal to about four Palace no.
tells. 1t was this ore that made the Tor
tunes of so many men, and to get 1t out
required particularly skilltul engineer
ing, There was wall running down at
all angle or about 40 degrees anu 'his
Eall marked the limits OF the loose
earth which contained TINS watermelon
of ore, and this same loose earth was
continually moving Immediately sur
rounding the lump OF ore was clay' ana
this clay so moved IN the natural process
Of natures action that by the miners 1t
was called creeping clay and watched
continually So irresistible was It's force
that nothing could stand against IL.
From the l,lUO 1oot IeVel the drllt
was set III toward TINS pody OF ore
| There was gallery where the car ran
along for taking out the ore, ana from
| this gallery ran the smaller DRIFTS.
Above, below ana on the sldes OF THESE
smaller drifts were heavy tlmbers Of
Nevada pine There was between the
tlmbers space OF about on the average
feet III height and feet III width
| These were square sets, and 1t was these
timbers that, by the action OF the loose
earth around them, were so compressed
that pieces Of them look more like stone
than wood,
At one time, about 1887, the enSi
neers of the Nevada mine believed thai
they almost reached the limitation Of
the Big Bonanza ore. So they went bacl
to the main shaft and sank down to TIT
1900 foot level, working, as they after
ward found, below this eccentric deposi
on the side of Mount Davidson. Find
ing that they were striking no pay dirt
they went back to the / 100 foot leve
to rework the Big Bonanza.
1t was then that this compressed tim
Der was found for the first time, so ia
as is generally known, in the history o
the world. These timbers were II by l
inches, and were the ones that were use
in the square sets when, in lS74-5-6-
the Big Bonanza was worked. But whe
they returned some years later to rewor
the Bonanza, instead of being II b
II inches, the timbers were about
inches in width, because while they ha
been working on the lower level the sic
of the mountain had been sliding dow
imperceptibly of course, but actually,
q subsequent comparison of the cond
ton of the first drift showed.
When the miners left the "squal
sets" on the 100 foot level in 1877