Santa Fe new Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1898-1951, 1898-05-30
A Natural Location For a Central Smelter,

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center is patent to anyone who will
glance at a map of the territory. The
Cerrillos district at home, which will
furnish vast quantities of fluxing ma
terial, the Iron mountain region, near
Eli%zabethtown with it's iron ores, the
Elizabethtown district with its silicious
ferruginous ores, the Badly, Sulphide,
Red River, Hematite and other regions
to the north, will furnish contracts
for sufficient ores to keep a large plant
in operation at Santa Fe.
Railway freights to Santa Fe from
these regions would not exceed $2 per
ton. Rio Grande, Santa Fee and Dem
YER & Gulf railroad branches would be
pushed at once into the principal min
ing centers and the exorbitant hauling
charges now essential in moving ore
from the isolated mining regions would
soon be a thing of the past. Capital
would eagerly seek the territory and in
a short while innumerable new proper
ties would be opened. However, aside
from new development, there is suffi'
cient ore now in sight in the mines OF
the above districts to warrant the cree
ton of a 2OO-ton smelling plant. A
rustling ore buyer could easily contract
for sufficient ore to keep the plant ir
constant operation. Coke from the
Gardner ovens and coal from a hundred
different localities could be secured IL
abundance, and, were the incentive suf
fcient, a much cheaper rate could b.
| obtained for these articles than exists a
present.
A ready market for ores would soOr
revolutionize mining in the territory, for
instead of passing by low grade PROPOSE
lions, the miner and p%rospector woult
see where a reasonable profit could b.
derived from them. In some of the 10
calities mentioned above it is now con
sidered useless to work properties Civ
ling less than $50 per ton values. 4
centrally located smelter in New Mex
leo would furnish a market for the ore
of hundreds of properties that are nov
lying idle, by reason of the fact that thu
ores are not high grade enough to war
trant shipment to the Colorado market.
In an editorial recently published ii
the New MEXICAN a plan of erecting
plants for the treatment of the ores o,
various mining centers was outlined
But in some of the localities, where
straight amalgamation, cyanide, OF
chlorination, was given as the proper
mode of treatment, the processes applied
only to the free, or oxydized zones
Depth, wherein a higher percentage O
lead is shown In the silicious %ferruginou.
ores, or where the free plane merge'
into the sulphide, will show ore no
amenable to treatment by any of thu
lighter processes, and wherein a smelte
is absolutely necessary. The plan a
outlined, of distributing plants so gen
erously for the treatment Of surface ores
would furnish a home market for tn
low grade ores, while the higher grad
refractory ores could be shipped to
centrally located smelter. In mos
large mines the ores from the first, o
first and second levels, are milled on tn
ground, the medium grade ores suscer
tible to such treatment shipped to con
venient cyanide or c%hlorination works
while the high grade refractory ores
are sent to the smelters. This gives tn
benefits to home treatment, short haul
age and sharp smelter composition 70
each large mine. The shelters will als'
! bid for. the silicious ores against tn