Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1918-06-05
Bill EiItLl. MINING
G. Ney Holman Predicts Busy fu-
Dture for the Town.

{. vey Holman OF Rockland
State assayer, predicts that Bluehill viii
IN time be an important mining region.
When In midsummer OF 1915, revived
meiaIIiierous mining in the picturesque
seaboard villsge of BluehiIl, it was be-
cause OF a profound conviction that Maine
possessed an endow ment of natural re-
sources that had too long remained idle
and that WAS capsule of being developed
into an asset OF great Importance to our
State as we'll as proportion of genuine
significance TO our national defense in any
crisis such as that which nov stAres Us so
sternly in the face" said Mr.. Holman In
Mn interview with he Commercial Satur-
day.
Manganese had been mined there 10 a
limited extent at the time when the
KaIahdin Iron WORKS were outpuiting
from a single blast furnace a charcoal
iron of exceptional quality.
"Molybdennm had been Identified in
the GRANTEES OF Biuehill Falls at as early
date as 1888 by DIR. Charles I, Jackson,
Names first State geologist, IN many re-
spects the most remarkable among my
predecessors in that office,
Copper OF exceedingly high quality
had been produced there from ore ex-
tracted from the Douglas, Twin Lead,
Bluehill and other mines, several of which
possessed shelters and reduced their pro-
duet TO refined copper. Around the ruins
OF the old mine buildings OF several uf
these producers OF the by-gone times lay
huge heaps OF ore, some raw as 1t was
hOisted from the underground workings,
but the larger part partially or wholly
roasted TO remove its sulphur content.
Careful samplings of these old ore piles at
various times when had visited the old
camp had shown me that much OF the ore
in these abandoned properties ran as high
as hve per cent. in copper, and all OF 1t
was OF grade emitting il to treatment by
the modern meialengicaI processes which
had superseded the crude and primitive
methods OF winning the red metal from
its ores which prevailed not only at Blue
hill but throughout the copper mining
world at that period, in the late 70's and
early SOS of the 18th century.
Just here it is not inappropriate to ex-
plain that the closing down OF mining OPP
erations in the Bluehill copper district at
that earlier period was not due either to
physical exhaustion OF the ore deposits or
to diminution of their uetalliferous tenor.
That the camp was abandoned, as it then
seemed, beyond resuscitation, was attrib-
utsbie TO causes wholly outside OF the
region or the State.
s'Secretan, an ambitious and daring
French finaneier, had attempted the
audscious feat OF eornering the worlds
supply of copper. To accomplish this
he undertook to secure control, first,
of the output of the metal by buying up
the principal copper mines of two henri
spheres, and secondly of the price for it,
b. purchasing all offerings in the markets
of the world.
His enterprise, apparently successful
for time, met ultimately with that
failure than which the poet assures us
there is no tiercer hell.
"His collapse produced a world wide
panic in the metai-mining world and
came near upsetting the financial balance
of two continents.
"Up to that time the average cost of
producing copper at Bluehill had ranged
somewh here between twelve and fourteen
cents a pound.
Following secretan's failure, refined