Weekly journal-miner., 1909-09-29
MANY CHANGES ARE SEEN
 IN MINING CIRCLES
From Wednesdays Daily.)

(From Wednesdays Daily.)
 The closing of the old ArgO smelter of the Boston & Colorado Smelling company serves to illustrate the chan geable conditions under which this method of metal reduction is con ducted. It serves on the other hand, to show how prolonged have been the favorable smelting conditions in Colo radO. The plant near Denver has been in operation for thirty-one years, while its predecessor at Black Hawk was active for eleven years prior to the change. Within the last few years very pronounced readjustments have been made in the smelting indus try, adn the center of influence has shifted materially. Colorado can no longer claim to be the home of West ern smelling, though it has by no means taken a second position. h. deed, it is still the leader in the lead-smelting business.
 A con ,eption of what has happened in this department of metal prOGuc- tion cannot be had without a full realization of the growth that has been made in the sphere of copper mining. The extensive discoveries of red metal deposits, in which Colorado has not shared, have brought into ex- istence in other states the means of reducing these resources to bullion. Not only have smelters been designed strictly to accommodate ores in which the copper content is the chief desid- eratum, but outside plants have been able to successfully compete for cop per-gold ores, also silver-bearing, with which Colorado has been we'll favored. In recent years, gold-bearing copper matte has been often shipped to the Utah plants. The use of copper as a collecting agent in the smelting pro- cess has made steady gains, while the use of lead in this capacity has de- clined. Available lead resources have been on the decrease, and it is gen orally recognized that the supplies of lead have passed their maximum.
 While the Argo smelter is a copper plant and there are several institu- tions in Colorado capable of turning out copper matte, the principal smelt- CTS now in operation in this state are the lead furnaces of the American Smelling and Refining company, To- cated at its works in Denver, Pueblo. Leadville and Durango. The Ameri- can Smelting and Refining company controls a very large percentage of the lead output of the United States, Canada and Mexico. The Argo was built upon the resources of northern Colorado, but the copper content of the ores has been on the decline, and the management admit that they are no longer able to operate at a profit. The copper smelters of the west have naturally arisen elsewhere, and in Utah the so-ealled smelter trust has been forced to some extent, notwith- standing it's president recent referred to copper smelting as an analyzing business to engage in that business.
 It is supposed that the organization of the International Smelling & Re fning company, with United Metals Selling and Amalgamated backing, was due to the entrance of the Gug- genheims into the copper business and their persistent independence of these rival copper interests. It has further been said that the Interna- tional would invade the. realm of lead in competition with the American company, but this may have been only a threat. The reports con ,erning the probable purchase of the 1 Argo plant by the International have not been plausible, unless it were the of the purchasers to over laul re-equip and enlarge the works. It is hardly likely to bring any of its business to Colorado. WORK WILL