Bisbee daily review., 1908-09-13
(By Chas. A. Dinsmore)


 write of things as the light shines on thefn-so it is with the properties em- braced in the holding of the Moctezu' ma Copper company at Nacozari, So nora, Mexico. After visiting the Pi- lares mine, the principal working, feel to say, with the many others who have been accorded equal privileges, that it is the greatest mine l have ever seen. There are characteristics here, also, that make reasonable the statement of several eminent mining engineers recently at the property that they believe it to be the equal oi the Rio Tinto of Spain.
 Imagine, If you can, pear 20O0 feet long, 100 feet wide at the stem and 300 feet wide at the base, with skin from 10 to 300 feet thick, and with two seeds in the core, one averaging over 75xf75 feet, the other more than half so large. That is the Pilares mine-and all the skin and those two seeds are ore running to 10 per cent copper-and some of it runs away above it. They are now down some 500 feet in this property, the drill has gone another 400 feet-and they are In ore everywhere They are handling
 
 seedl as well as the skin on the stope and pillar system-work out a stope 50 feet, then leave 50-foot pillar of solid ore, and so on. When they take down the pillars they will do so on the top slicing system,
 Not so many years ago J. G. Alex ander, a competent mining man and prospector, went down into the heart of the Yaqui country" and after some time he found and located what is now the Pilares mine. He did some work, and ran in a tunnel about 70 feet, but the showing didn't justify the work and he turned down the pros pect and abandoneed it. Later short time the Guggenheims got hold Of it. and they worked out considerable ore in the "caliche" to the north of the deposit But this ore body pinched down to a very doubtful proposition. Now it is said (and nobody knows whether it's true) that the Guggen' helms decided when they thought their Pilares mine was pinching out that they'd give the Phelps-Dodge peo- pie chance to get rid of a big white elephant So MT. Douglas, pere, was seen about it, and he and his sons, J d look at it. They knew something about the country as a general rule and they knew a lot about copper. Ad- vising the purchase. the Douglases of course put 1t through. and the son, James S., was put in charge, That he has developed one of the greatest cooper mines on the continent speaks in volumes of the sagacity and mining 1f n
 One reaches Nacozari through Doug las. Ariz., and by way of the Ferrocar- Til de Nacozari, a railway owned by the Phelps Dodge interests, who also own the MocteZuma Copper company, the Copper Queen mines at Bisbee, the Copper Queen smelter at Douglas, and other extensive properties throughout this section as well as the famous coal fields of the Dawson Min ing company at Dawson, N. M. This road takes one up and down through a winding valley, with towering peaks on every side, and fertile fields all re- freshfng after the hundreds of miles trayeled over arid wastes to get here. The distance from Douglas is about 75 miles. The town of Nacozari is owned by the mining company, and Manager James s. Douglas is really the monarch He has studied this matter of town-making, too, as is eyl- dent by the success of his initial et- fort. Here are two saloons, one for the Mexican laborers and the other for the higher classes of all races. The first closes at p. m., the latter at g. and neither love, money nor frleno- shin can induce any particle Of the liouids to be dispensed at either place till 5 o'clock the next morning. The company owns and conducts fhe no tel. first class in every way; owns the store. one of the largest wholesale and retail establishments in the south west. owns the waterworks, electric light plant-in fact, everything but the people-3nd there are those who say they own a majority of these.
 The country is very rugged. An abundance of timber is found every where, and there is water in abund- ance and of very good quality. The general formation is an andesite, with belts or dykes of rhyolite cutting fhrourh now and then, and sometimes a little lime. The ore (copper) makes in the andesite. At times small mss ures cross the country and carry us 1aIIy high silver values, tetrahedrite heinz the predominating metal Tn these Sometimes go1d In good quan- fi4v is associated. Sometimes, too, the copper runs very high, and now al one small property leasers are taking ot,1 quantities of almost solid red OK ide running extremely high. The eountry is so stable that if one tnds inc conditions he well nigh knows what he will get, thus making ex- ploitation less hazardous than com mon. The small properties being worked pay handsomely, as well as the big
 narrow gauge railway takes one from the town to the mine, a distance of about four miles. This mine is called the Piiares. The railway stops al inc mouth of a 6000-foot tunnel which ends at the Pilares shaft. In about a third of the distance of the tunnel is the s'Y'YY shaft From the t,1nueI floor to the surface is about ROO feet in the Pilares shaft. and at the surface is the town Of Pilares. where are the sTorks of the mine and where the mine workers live. C. A Smith is general mine foreman VII liam Knight and W B. Hicks under ground foremen; E. M. Rabb and George Putnam, civil engineers, and WiIiiam Mckenzie, timekeeper. There is quite a town hehe, the Mexican miners living in excellent brick houses built by the company. The office building Is ample, and the big