Daily inter mountain. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1881-1901, 1901-03-11
Some Of the Odd Types
Met With in Butte

Much of the picturesque, the visibly
romantic of the Old-time mining camp,
has vanished in the omn:present reign
of the commonplace. Yet anyone who
knows the preseint -hay mining camps
we'll and who burrows beneath the OUT
wTavdly dull surface finds many rJ-
mances of real life. Indeed, the mining
camp lis fun of curious personal his
tories. by reason of the very nature Of
the establishment and growth of these
places. Here, far up in the mountains
Of Colorado or Montana or British CO.
lumbia, stands THE disarray of rough
board cabins, scrambling up hillside
barren and rocky, with a few better
houses interspersed. The camp boasts
one main street, it's glory, wlereon ara
shops, restaurants, offices, saloons and
dance halls. There is Il small news
paper, there are doctors and lawyers
offices, there is court house with an oc
caSiondl term of court. The camp has.
perhaps, been in existence six or seven
years 1t may have "a branch line OF
marrow gauge railroad running up to il;
if not, its outside communication is a
stagecoach. The entire assemblage, its
inha bi tants, interests, all have Suddenly
appeared On this remote mountain tnp
Plainly such a community must le
made up of people who are drifting
about the country, who have no settled
place in society, who have built up NJ
position or whose position has been shat
tered. A species of universal distrtiss
reigns over this congregation of men
and women, whose past is often shroud-
led in as much uncertainty as their flu
ture and of whom nothing is known eX-
cept what they choose to tell. This IS
not true of the mine superintendent
engineers, and many other men con-
nected with the mines. They have come
from other mining camps in the legiti-
mate and natural following of their pro>
fession or trade, and are known in their
own circles But it is true of the gem
eral cOncOurse-the merchants, stock
spectators, brokers, lawyers, doctors
and nondescrpts. A more cosmopolitan
society of it's members is scarcely i'm
aginable. The mining camp gathers all
kinds from all places.
DO you see that man." said a mining
engineer to me. He pointed to fine
looking man of So, standing in kind of
small office in a log cabin. Piacards-
1.-THE Mountain Brewing Company.
"Patronize Home Industries, Buy Be i
Brewed in Our Own Camp were con-
spicuous on the wallis
y
known in New York society. He has
been around the world three times, once
in his own yacht. He speaks French
and German. and is one of the few
| Americans who have been members OF
| the Paris Jockey club. He knows Paris,
| Vienna and London as we'll as he knows
New York. And he is widely read in
the bargain. You see what he's doing
today. It's a great country for getting
men down to hardpan.
What happened to him?"
"Oh! some scandal about a woman.
His wife divorced him, his father turned
him out and cut him off, and here he is
running a small brewery. a thousand
miles from nowhere"
And the engineer laughed the laugh
which is typical of the mining country
| in such "a connection, for when man
of good family, of position at home,
| comes out to the west after having
! taken a "cropper" in some way, whetha<
| through his fault or misfortune, he be
| comes a standing joke. When his
| former glories are retailed, along with
his present occupation, it is always with
a laugh.
| 1t is hard country the west, and it
rather ptumes itself on the fact. 1t ha
no illusion. 1t is Materiality spelled IN
capitals. 1t is community which does
no theorizing about democracy, but i
democracy. Here all men have returned
to print tive conditions. No one would
| be in such "a place as a small mining
camp who had money, therefore, 1t is a
scene of the fight to death for Dread
and every one is on an absolute eQuahty
Each man for himself and the devil FOL
us all, is the slogan. In very truth the
| Ai,o %1a nVdc nj IS
mining camp.
! The primi tiveness of the conditions is
indicated by three words which I have
| heard time and time again-the tire,
words of the question, Are you eating"
| There are always many "dead-brokes
in the camp-men who can't get wor!:
men who won't work, men who are just
out of work, men who are playing i!
! hard luck" in some way or other. Are
you eating ?"-that is the matter o.
| prime solicitude.
In such a country it does not matter
| to what a man puts his hand, and mer
of every class do every kind of work
Last spring, in "a camp in northec!
Washington, near the Canadian bOun =
airy, l was watching some grading N
progress beside large mine. A gang o
twenty OR thirty men were breaking
ground and shoveling the earth. Quit
close to me We're two men In oVerall
ahlv using their picks. They We're per
haps 25 and 30 years old. Presently on
of them stopped and mopped his fore
head.
II say" he called to his companion
1T wish Ganymede would come along
with the water pail
The other stopped, too. and grinned
Then he pointed down hill to the black
smiths shop. where the water boy Wa!
standing. 'He's down there giving nee
tar to Vulcan" he called back.
One was a graduate of prominen
eastern university. He bad Inherited
considerable fortune; he had dabbled IL
Wall street and lost it all. Comins
west in disgust, he had beeen forced t.
day labor because he could find no othe
yea to the question of the three words
The other was Canadian lawyer
| 70 vVocffco 1,