Mohave County miner., 1906-04-07
a Great Mine.

There are many great mines in Col
oradO, but unfortunately all of them
not only are not Portlands, but also
they are not all so placed that elabor-
ate detailed reports of their annual
operations are given to the public.
The stock of the Portland company is
widely distributed and so the annual
reports of its officers are printed and
become open to all. The 1905 report
Just published gives a view well worth
getting.
From such a report one gathers some
idea of what vast possibilities there
are in mining as well as of the magni-
tude of Cripple Creek. Here is a mine
that has produced %, 1O2, 327.9SS in the
twelve years since its discovery. 1t
has paid out of this 6,457 ,0S0.50S in
dividends; the remainder of the vast
sum has gone for labor, for supplies,
for railroad haul and milling charges,
distributed among multitude of
workers and business men. The own
ers have made a forth of the sum as
the return not only for their discovery
of the hidden store of nature, but also
and principally as reward for that
eternal vigilance and adherence to
business laws that alone make for sue
cess in any line of effort. They might
have produced as much and made
nothing had they not applied to their
business the same principles of accom-
plishing the most for the least outlay
or the least effort that every man
must apply to his business or his Ia
Dor. We hear so much these days of
the part labor plays in building up
big enterprises that these remarks are
worth making in passing. The priva-
tions and hardships the locators of
this mine went through led to its dis
covery: their business ability and per-
severance brought it not only to its
present high position among mines and
made them rich men, but the benefit
they have worked for the state and
the community, the business their dis
covery set in motion, can not be meas
ured even by the millions the mine
has produced.
But there are other figures in the
report that speak as clearly for the
greatness of the Cripple Creek dis
trict as do those of production and
dividends. In the early days of the
camp there was expressed in some
quarters fear of the permanency of the
deposits. The Portland mine has 30
miles of underground workings; its
various levels, drifts, wines, shafts
and upraises measure that length. 1t
is being worked now from a shaft
LOO feet deep, from which levels cut
some of the veins several hundred feet
deeper, and the farther they go in the
earth the richer the ore bodies are
found to be and the more valuable the
mine becomes.
After making a gross output of D.
373,6O0.l AS last year the mine at the
end of the period showed more ore
than it was known to contain at the
beginning. Great as its yield has been,
it grows greater with the years.
This is important to know, because
the mine but reflects the Cripple
Creek district in its entirety. What
the Portland is proving in its own case
will be found to hold true throughout
the camp. Now and then some indi-
vidual mine may, through some local
condition, go beyond its own hold up
on an ore shoot, but the ore itself goes
deeper and deeper into the ground
and leads the stopers on to greater
riches than the work accomplished has
ever forecast. By reason of the large
area the Portland commands the fu-
ture and will probably continue to be
the most representative of the Cripple
Creek mines, and its reports will grow
in interest with the years.-Denver
Republican.
The