New Britain herald., 1916-01-11
BRAZIL HAS DEEPEST
 MINE IN WORLD
Combined Depths Of Connected
 Shafts Total 5,824 Feet

!
 a question very few people in this
 country can answer correctly. Even
 most mining experts would probably
 i make a wrong guess-unless they
 had made rather exhaustive inquir-
 ies anent the subject-for it is To-
 cated in a section Of the world where
 you would least expect to find it. Tn
 the forests which cover the hills that
 cluster about the mouth of the mine ! wild monkeys are chattering and ] jumping about from limb to limb of l the graceful palms which afford them 1 food as well shelter, while among | the bright-hued flowers exquisite or i chids wait their perfume and display 1 their beauty for the benefit of these ! impish progenitors of man. Birds of
 rare plumage fit ir and out among | the shadows and the gorgeous red i blue-yellow macaws add their raucous voices to the medley of sounds while l splendid butterflies wave their large wings of irrdescent blue and green | and gold to enhance the riot of color 1 in these tropic realms.
 Tropic realms? Verify, for the 1 deepest mine-gold or of any other
 metal-is located in Brazil. It is near place bearing the euphonious name of Villa Move de Lima, in the State of Minas Geraes. about 330 ! miles north of Rio de Janeiro. It has been worked, more or less sys- tematically, for something over 80 years, and yet few of in the United States have ever heard of the place much less of the mine. which is known as the Morro Velho and is ! owned and operated by an English company.
 Found by Professors.
 Last year two young professors of
 geology. Benjamin Le Roy Miller, of
 Lehigh University, and Joseph T. Singewald Jr., of Johns Hopkins, struck out for foreign parts and wended their way even into the hidden recesses of South America with the view of finding out some | thing in regard to the mineral re- | sources of the western hemisphere. ] They investigated almost all of the 1 known mining districts of the south ern continent and brought back with them vast store of information re- lative to the mineral wealth of the various countries visited, and it was in Brazil that they found this uns1 ual and in some respects unrivalled gold mine. They tell about it in an article in the December number of the Bulletin of the Pan American Union Washington, D. C.,) from 1 which the following facts are taken |
 The Morro Velho mine is located in the gold belt of Brazil, where the Portuguese were first induced to set tie by the discovery of the yellow metal. The first gold was discovered in 1899 near the present city of Ouro | black substance and hence was cal,- ed 'ouro preto"-black gold. The l city which they founded was long | called Villa Rica de Ouro Preto-- l the Rich City of Black Gold-a name which was somewhat cumbersome even for the Portuguese, so they fin- ally shortened it to just Ouro Preto, the name by which it is known today. Once upon a time it was about tho l most important city in Brazil, gold W working surrounding it and the val uabIe metal being obtained from the gravel of almost every stream in the region. Not only the stream gravels l yielded gold, but many gold bearing quartz veins were worked.
 Depth 5,s24 Feet
 Just when the Morro Velho mine l was first opened is not known, but it l was being operated toward close of the 17th century and considerable work had been done when the present l company obtained control of it in 1884. The ore body consists of a great vein of unusual persistence and reg ularity that dips into the earth at an ! angle of about 45 degrees. It may be Hkened to a gigantic knife blade, ] held vertically and thrust into the 1 earth at this angle with the point l still lower than the present deepest workings. An it is these workings ! that make the mine remarkable. The combined depths of the connected | shafts give total of 5,S24 feet. Tn 1 other words, here is gold mine that ] IS pelng worked at a depth of more 1 than mile below the surface of the l earth. Now be it remembered that the rock temperatures increase as the earth's crust is penetrated. in some regions the increase being as much as 1 degree F. for each 50 to 60 feet increase in depth At this rate the temperature at the bottom of this mine would be over 100 de- grees higher than at the surface and 1 fried ham and eggs might be pre- pared for the miners without any other heating apparatus than the loose rocks lying about. Incident ally the miners would be going through the frying process too For tunately, however, in this mine the rate of increase of temperature is only l degree for every 100 to 12O feet, giving the rocks a temperature of only 112 degree. By forcing cool ed air down into the mine by means of fans the temperature is lowered 10 | a little less than 100 degrees. Even at that it is rather snug, and the miners usually wear only shoes, don ming trousers when company is ex- pected. Still, the mine has produced | a total of about 55.000,000 worth of gold, and is being worked now at q pr0Gt 0f oth 1