Daily Arizona silver belt., 1907-12-07

copper output of the greatest three mines stood thus for 1906:
 l Copper Queen ..... 71,7ll,Sl3 pounds Calumet and Arizona 36,934,3s pounds United Verde ............ 3s,s27 ,365 pounds
 Total ........,............147,5 ,579,565 pounds
 That is very nearly 5S per cent of the whole sworn output for 1906 as re- turned by the assessors.
 The output of those three great prop critics is made 1t a very low cost be- cause first, tie average grade of their ore is high and they are producing on a large scale; second, the management of each is energetic and we'll skilled in copper mining; third, each possesses ample capital to employ all machinery that will conduce to economy, and, fourth, each owns its whole smelting and converting plant.
 The Cooper Handbook careful and reliable authority, states the mum Der of men employed by the Calumet and Arizona, in both the mining and smelting departments, at 1000 for 1906. The Copper Queen should therefore em- ploy in about the same proportion, but say 2,200, since they were not probably in 1906 producing quite so high grade of ore as the Calumet and Arizona. The payroll of the United Verde should not exceed l,200.
 This foots a total of 4,400 men.
 It will'be a very liberal estimate to states the Average wages of this force at $4 day from top to bottom. The labor cost theN would be $l7,600 day for 300 days in the year--total for the year, $5,2s0,00(. That would give an average of $l,200 year to each man employed in tho mining and smelting departments.
 We shall certainly be on the safe side in calling the labor cost, as thus esti- mated, half of the total cost of the finished copper as sold in New York as sold, observe.
 It costs commission to get it sold.
 The items of cost aside from labor would be, power, eoks, freight on blister copper to New York, eleetrolytic rein ing, commission for selling. Those items should actually foot up about million dollars less than the labor cost as es- timated but in order not to seem to force the result we will say the la bor cost was half the total cost of the finished copper as sold in New York. Development, pumping, timbering and amortization, are covered by the cost of mining and smelting.
 The total cost of the l47, 7,573, ,565 pounds of finished copper produced by Arizona s greatest three mines would therefore be $10,560,O00, and the cost per pound would be .07l56 cents.
 But by referring again to the sworn tax statements we find that the average value of the gold and silver in those three mines was nearly eight mills for every pound of finished copper pro duced. and dedueting this, the net cost of the copper is shown to be .06356 cents pound.
 The Boston News Bureau recently stated the cost of the Calumet & Ari zona copepr at 6 cents. l have else where seen it stated at 5.7 cents, but as the basis of calculation was not stat ed in either ease l think it safest to ig- nore them. It has often been stated that the United Verde produces it's cop. per at net cost of , cents. This may be true, for the gold and silver values are higher in that mine than in the Bis bee properties. They averaged for 1906 about l-3 cents to the pound of fin ished copper and in earlier years they are reported to have averaged much higher.
 It will be seen that I have not adopt ed any published statements of cost, but have sought to "derive" the cost by calculation of the normal expense, figured with the sworn output.
 That accounts for 5S per cent of the total at net cost of less than 6la cents pound. The remaining Az per cent probably cost a good deal more, but as it was produced by twenty-seven small CT mines operating under widely vary ing conditions it would be an endless task to work out the cost. Many of them are without smelting and convert ing plants of their own, and some of them were at the ruinous disadvantage that small and remote mines often have to endure as to transportation and min ing facilities. Many of them indeed are really to be regarded as still in the prospect stage, and the cost is therefore abnormally high.
 But the five or six most important producers in the Globe and the Clifton Morenci districts produced years ago when the price of copper ranged close to 9 cents, and as they were probably not in business for their health at that time, it is reasonably safe to assume they earned profit with the price of copper swinging between 9 cents and l012 for three years.
 The five largest and oldest mines of the Globe and the Clifton Morenci dis triets produced in 1906 jointly 76,327, 915 pounds, which was close to 30 per cent of the assessed output for the whole of Arizona for that year. These mines have reduction plants of their own and produce blister copper. What the average cost is do not know, but l think it cannot exceed cents net after deducting the value of the by products.
 The output of Arizona's foregoing eight largest mines accounts for SS per cent of the sworn output of the whole territory, or 223,901 ,479 pounds, and the net cost of all this is .07444 cents a pound.
 I think the net cost of the remaining