The Arizona copper camp., 1917-11-17
STATE SME[TER
COMMITTEE IS
INVESTIGATING

InVLUIluHIIVu
PHOENIX, Nov. 16.-The commit
tee appointed by the last legislature
to look into the various questions at
tending the proposal to build state
smelter and report thereupon has es-
tablished it's working organization and
is now engaged upon the gathering of
data to place before the next legisla-
ture. Senator John G.. Devine, the
member of the committee from Pinal
county, has been made chairman of
the Investigating organization and
headquarters established in his Phoe-
nix offices, where the first meeting of
the committee was held this week.
Discussion of the proposed relief
for small operators of mining proper
ties in the state has developed con-
siderable difference of opinion. Those
are not lacking who believe that a
state smelter would fall short of pro-
viding the advantages which it is de-
sired to bring about. There are ad-
vocates of mills, crushers, sampling
works and teaching plants among
those who fail to see in the smelter
proposal the relief that is sought
A particularly clear argument set
ting forth the disadvantages of a smell
ter in comparison with other available
methods is provided in the following
letter to the Arizona chapter A. M.
c., by A. G. Rowsey, a Tucson news
paper man, who formerly was inter
ested in mining in Colorado:
'Theorized as source of enormous
returns now lost in some way un-
known, the state smelter, the indie
pendent smelter, matchmaking plant
which theoretically will return to it's
customer 95 per cent Of the recover
able assets of his mine, is lurking
somewhere in the mind of every in
dependent miner in the state. To
some it is dream, to others an ener-
gizing force, to others, a demand that
will not be stayed by any argument
short of such a plant-and of such a
failure as it of necessity will be unless
there is a great change in the meth
DDS of the miners themselves.
II have heard, and SO has everyone
else, earnest men preach as gospel
that the Arizona smelters will not
take ore when the price is high. They
will not accept small irregular con-
signments, lowgrade ores, and so on
indefinitely, with variations CORE
spending to the individual experience
with the smelters. | do not know the
Arizona mining methods. / do know
that no miner in Colorado, where
hail from, would think of sending the
kind of stuff to smelters l have seen
shipped through Tucson. The Colo
RADIO smelters would not take it, or,
if they took it, they would promptly
affix penalties that would prevent a
like shipment reaching the loading
cars. For most of it was plain, sim
pie or complex rock-gangue, which in
the ordinary course of events would
result simply in loading the smelte1
with bulk without value, or with bulk
with detriment to the rest of the
charge To my mind, and any Colo
RADIO miner may correct me if he
chooses, your Arizona smelters are
and refusing low-grade because every
one is so greedy to get into the smell
ter that they work against each 9th
er's interests, shutting out possibility
of equalization of smelter space with
plain rock, gangue which pays nobody
and costs high
ter, or more smelters, that is the
prime need of Arizona, but custom
concentrating plants that will handle
the ores of the various districts where
the companies are unable to equip
themselves. The state needs more
flOtation plants, where the concentra-
ton can be carried on to a high value.
These plants, these concentration
mills, are not expensive, not difficult
to run with the non-compleX minerals
of Arizona. And they are plants that
would give to the miner or the min
ing company, yield of hundreds of
dollars through the concentration of
by-products that is lost now in the
smelter smoke and goes neither to the
smelter nor the miner
"Most important of ALL and all
around. most desirable, these plants
would reduce the freight charges on
shipments more than so per cent and
increase the value of the concentrate