Arizona republican., 1899-02-08
AW WONDERFUL, STRIKE
Nine That Produce d a Million
 in Six Weeks.
D. II. RiOrdan of Flagstaff Tells About inc Marvellous Run of Ore Taken From inc BOdle Mine in Nevada in 1875.


 sesses an imagination. It was tolt yesterday by Mr D. M. Riordan
 formerly of Flagstaff, who was spend
 ing the day in the city. MT. RiordaI
 was discussing the recent rich strike.
 i'll Yavapai county, and his miad r5
 Verted to the days when he was ac
 lively employed in mining ventures II
 California and Neveda.
 in June. 1S7S,'' he said, "I was
 working in Carson, Nevada, and was asked by my immediate superior H. NJ
 Yerington, how soon I could clean IlI
 my detail work and get ready to go out
 to Bodie. I told him l could
 be ready in few hours
 He said I wish you would get ready u
 take the stage tomorrow morning and
 go out to the Syndicate Mill I had
 my work rounded up and was ready
 to leave on the following morning s
 stage and upon my arrival took up duties of subordinate character
 which I did my best to perform. In the course of a couple months or so was superintendent of the mill, which was then running as a custom mill on Standard ore The Standard Mine at that time was the big producer and dividend payer of the camp. BOdic was a typical mining camp. situated at an altitude of about ten thousand feet on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevadas and only about four miles from the Nevada state line. It was about eight miles west of Aurora, cne of the old phenomenal mining camps of Nevada.
 'EThe Syndicate Mill was a brick mill, the machinery in it being the odds and ends of half a dozen old mills put together to work BOdie ores. It was 115 or 12O miles from the nearest railway station. Freight was two cents pound from the railroa1. Wood was twelve dollars a cord. The camp grew from practically nothing to be a town of ten thousand people in year mine which was bought for saw it, started in paying $25 ,CO) a month dividends after it was got in shape to work. These dividends were soon after increased to $5) ,030 a month and subsequently, to $75,000, and dur ing the three years 1 had knowledge of the property it never missed a dividend.
 There was one place in the mine that was called The Treasury" The ore from this place was said to go S10,- GOO to $20,O00 to the ton, and it was the custom whenever there were any ex- traordinary expenditures, in order to not diminish the dividends to go into this place and get out ton or two as needed to keep up the month s ordin- ary and extraordinary output.
 "The Bodie mine was the adjoining claim on the south, and was sunk to the depth of 20 feet with horse whin The veins in BOdia hill we. e supposed to run practically parallel and to dip towards the center as depth was gained in a manner similar to the fingers of ones hand while he'd up with the open palm. Acting on this theory the Bodie folks decided to run 9 cross-cut on the south line of the Standard property which was the north line of their claim, and at the depth of about 250 feet. In doing this they intersected fifteen or seventeen different viens. The main vein, Or the one which was supposed to be the Standard vein, showed little or TO value where it was intersected, but smaller vein called the Burgess vein showed some values and on this vein q drift was run which in going south distance of 26 or 27 feet developed chamber of ore over nine feet Ill width. and which ran up to nearly $100 000 Q ton.
 'sThe Bodie folks immediately made arrangements with the Standard pep pie to change our mill from Standard ore to Bodie ore and from that cham Der of ore we milled and shipped over a million dollars in gold bullion in six weeks. During the crushing of this J not run more than five stamps, or one battery, although the mill was a twenty-stamp mill with pan capacity to correspond. - We have had the amalgam accumulate in the pans not once but frequently, so that IL would stop the engine.
 ''In one days run that I remember we got about nine hundred pounds of gold amalgam. 1 have had the gold accumulate in a battery until, rec 0g- | niZing by the sound that the StamrS were no longer crushing rock and tha It they were not striking iron, l would | take off the screen to find that the gold had accumulated in the bottom of the mortar until it was flush with the dies, and l have taken out Of single | mortar with an ordinary iron fire shovel such as we used in cleaning up, | free gold enough to fill a Wells, Fargo | Express box. Eighty pounds Of amalgam from one charge in the pans was a very usual thing during that run of ore. and we were obliged to re- tort during the whole time as rapidly | as the retort could be cooled and a fresh charge of amalgam put into it.
 During the run Of this ore Peter Bob Pixley and myself one day went into the mines and before going we stopped at one of the stores and got an ordinary 5-lb shot bag to take with us for sample sack. We filled this shot bag with loose dirt out of the face Of the drift with our hands. From this We banned | out, in Porter Holmes office after com ing down, gold enough to make four match boxes Any miner will rn1e-- stand what this means. It is fact that this run unfitted some Of cur best ! men for ordinary mines or ordinary | ore thereafter
 After the richness Of this ore and |