Mountain Home Republican. [volume] (Mountain Home, Idaho) 1915-1946, 1921-08-27
EXTENSIVE WORK
Being STARTED
At FEATHERVILLE
Rich Ground Owned BY
c aptain Winters a t
Featherville Taken Over
BY Harmon Interests
Start Work on Dredge.

Following is the substance of an
interview given by Capt. Winters to
the Boise papers last week:
Within the next Is days con-
struction work will be started on a
$4,000 dredging boat which will
be completed and put in operation
by the first of May, 1922, on rich
placer ground situated along the
Boise and Feather rivers, in Elmore
county. w. P. Harmon heads the
company which is starting this gi-
gantic operation. He is one of the
largest gold dredging operators in
the United States, if not in the
world, as he operates in California,
Washington, Oregon, Colorado and
in several other countries besides
the United States.
The lands owned by the Harmon
Estate company contains between 70
and so million cubic yards of ground
averaging between 16 and IS cents
per cubic yard, according to careful
prospects made over the entire area.
1t is the intention of the operating
company to put in two dredges and
the pit in which the first will be put
is now being dug. This dredge will
have a capacity of 5000 cubic yards
per day. Material for the first
dredge is now on the train and be-
ing shipped to Mountain Home. The
contract for moving the lumber and
material from the Elmore county
seat to the dredging ground, So miles
north Of Mountain Home, has been
let to c. b. Faraday.
As soon as the ground in front of
the first boat has been worked suf-
ficiently to move the boat ahead, a
second dredge will be constructed
which will have a capacity of be-
tween 10000 and 10000 cubic yards
a day. With the two dredges work
ing double shifts, it will require Is
years to work over the ground owned
by the company.
Some rs men will be employed by
the company when operations are
first started and that force will
likely be increased to zoo when the
building of the second dredge is be-
gun.
To Captain Rupert Winters, of
Featherville, is due the credit for
engineering the operations which
brought the big placer operator in
to this territory. In 1910 Captain
Winters purchased the ground from
the Koelsch Brothers, of Boise. He
had prospected the ground and it
was his intention to work it by the
hydraulic method. In this he was
foiled because of the lowering Of the
water of the rivers and the decreas-
ing supply each year, which made
It impossible to work the ground at
a proft. His next movement was in
the interests of a dredging system
and he turned the land to Mr.. Ham
mon for this purpose and is continu
ing to engineer the operations for
the new owner until the dredging
of the land is started.
This deal makes another big min
ing proposition which will mean
much to southern Idaho. For sew
oral years considerable interest has
been taken in the Featherville prop
erty and just prior to the war, Cap
tain Winters was preparing to start
onerations there on an extensive
scale but was held up on account Of
the sudden stoppage of all large op-
erations for war activities.
Captain winters is the pioneer
dredge operator in southern Idaho
and the workings of the placer min
inc game from A to q. He installed
and operated the first dredge in the
poise basin country in 1898 for the
poise-Idaho Gold Dredging company
and continued with that company
mill 1909 when the property was
taken over by the Estabrook inter
ests