The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-05-29
CALUMET AND HECLA MINES
The Copper It Produces, the Labor It Employees, the Com.
munity It SUPPORTS and the Enormous Profits
It Makes for Its Owners.

lTO0k line IN AIneIlC0. 1nC Et8tiP
mills are two in number. the Calumet
and the Hecla, each having IL steam
stamps. The Alaska -Treadwell mine
has $50 stamps. the Simmer q Jack
gold mine, neal johannesburg, South
Africa, has $50 and 10 the largest In
the world. yet the % stamps OF the
Calumet q Hecla could easily crush all
the rock of both the Treadweli and
Simmer & Jack mines. The gold-bear-
ing quartz is crushed by gravity
stamps, while the c~ongiomerate car
rying the copper is pulverized by Ball
stamps, where an 1s-inch piston Ia pro-
PEELED by steam at high pressure to
strike blows which make the earth
culver for q quarter of q mile about
the mills.
The process of extracting the copper
from h rock In simple In principle.
but amid h acres Of jigs. vanners
and siime-tables the beholder II more
apt to acquire q headache In striving
to grasp the immensely Of the enter
prise h a clear idea Of how 1t is
done. The rock. which has already
passed through crushers at the shafts,
Is fed into hoppers which deliver 1t
under the stamp. From the mortar
box where 1t Is crushed by the steam
stamp the rock passes through jigs and
vanning machines where al ever
COullkluOuo OuN kCItlC aooiSNCo
by innumerable sprays of water. sep
arate the coarser particles Of copper
from the worthless rock, the greater
weight Of the copper causing 1t to fall
In receptacles calculated for Its reten-
ton, while the water carries the light
er and from the crushed rock to fur
Their siftings. This process of selection
Is carried on from n machine to an
other, under ver-present Jets OF wat
err, until the very finest grains Of cop
per, and they are very minute indeed.
have been saved and only the worth
less sand remains from what was rock
carrying 3 to 10 per OF native
copper when 1t entered the big bins on
the top floor of the mill. As something
like 1000 tons of copper-bearing con-
glomerate rock are fed into these two
mills daily. all of which must be
crushed into sand, the waste sand
| from the machines would bury the ma
| chimes in "a hours IL II were not re-
moved. This process Of removal Is
most. simple, the only agents being
wooden launders and plenty Of run
ming water. Little launders run from
the side of each machine, carrying the
join, the size OF the launder grows, I'M
I'll as the stream emerge from the
mills there are a dozen rushing tor
rents of brick-red water. These are
carried to a big cistern. not far dis
tant. where a gigantic wheel, 100 feet
in diameter. keeps turning. its big
buckets on its inner periphery SCOOP
ing up the water from the cistern and
dumping IL nearly a hundred feet
above into an enormous wooden laun-
der which is elevated high in the ali
on great trestles, and which carries the
rapidly moving sand and water a quar-
ter of a mile into the lake, where a
reddish Niagara spouts increasingly
from the trough during the working
hours of the mill. At first the water
carrying the sand ran into the lake
near which the mills were placed. but
the lake was filled and 1T became ne
cessary to resort to the elevation OF
the water by the big sandwiches in
order to secure the necessary fall to
permit the water to sweep the sand
freely along with 1t. Many millions OF
tons of sand have been poured into
the lake and hundreds of acres of dry
ground now appear where there was
from 10 to so feet of water a quarter
Of a century ago
Not the least fascinating thing abou'
the Lake Linden works of the Calumet
& Hecla Is the big pump which fur
nishes water for the twin mills. Thi!
is by all odds the greatest pump in thu
world and is housed In a tall building
by itself. The pump stands some 81
feet in height and at each stroke force.
of the mills. 1t feeds from a big ce'
ment cistern having free connection
with the nearby lake, and every min
ute of the working day raises from
80, 900 to more than 10000 gallons o.
water. having a capacity of SO, 1000, 00
gallons q day, or more than twice tina
of the next largest pump ever con
, lee are nAf0hhnr In "a
pacity on this continent Ii the biz
"a, O0O,0 900 gallon pump which is de
servedly the pride Of the Philadelphia
water works.
A book has been written about tn
Calumet & Hecla mine. That was tel
years ago. when the mine was a mer'
toddler compared with what 1t now is
an encyclopedia might be WRITER
about the property now. The industr.
is SO vast that no one man knows al
about il. though the men at the hea'
of the concern know how to surroun'
themselves with heads Of department
who can and do thoroughly grasp tn
details of their branches of the work
Money is never spared for eQuipmen
or brains. With single engines costin
hundreds of thousands Of dollars an
with scores Of lives dependent upo
III knowledge and f~aithfulness Of
single employee. the question of wage
Is never allowed to come between tn
company n the best ability to b
hired.
The min has IA shafts. each q com
plete mine in itself and the smallest @
which would be held a very large min
? indeed in most mineral districts. Tn
greatest of these II h Red JACKIE
shaft, and 1t alone is not eQualled b
more thar q dozen American minei
The shaft is 1900 feet in vertical deptl
was begun in 1889 and bottomed In 1876
. after eight years incessant labor. II
|, dimensions. inside Of timbers. are 49,
by 25 feet, and IL contains six full-size
working compartments, our OF whic
are for hosting rock n lowerin
? timber, one for the safety ladders. n
quired for the escape Of the men |
ease of accident to the hoisting ma
chinery. and m for the water pipe
air pipes. electric light. power and te
ephone wires. Into this shaft migl
be dropped nine Washington mont