Montana oil and mining journal. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1931-1953, 1936-07-18
Two Southerners Discovered 1.-The Richest HILL
On Earth," Greatest Mining Center I'm America

entertaining metropolis. After a few
days they purchased supplies and
horses and returned to their new dig
gings. Humphrey and Allison we're
Butte's two first settlers. However, they
were not the first miners to prospect
on The Richest Hill on Earth" When
they arrived on the site of preSent-day
Butte, Humphrey and Allison found a
( prospect hole four or five feet deep.
1 Nearby were elk horns, which had evil
IDENTIFY been used in digging. From in
dications the two men decided that the
hole had been dug many years before.
/ Who dug 1t, there is no way of telling
Others had seen the hole before Al
/ iSon and Humphrey. One Caleb e.
Irvine. Transporting goods from Fort
Benton to Fort owen in the Bitter
Root valley, passed the old prospect
hole in 1860. No doubt many others
had seen this ancient mine.
So it came about that in the last year
of the Civil war, when Sherman was
making his famous march to the sea;
before the grading Of the Pacific rail-
road had been started at Council
Bluffs; and while the drama of the
being enacted, two wandering pros
pectors drove their claim stakes on
the hill that was destined to be the
greatest producer of them all.
BY the fall of 1864 comparatively
rich placerS had been struck by AL
nSon and Humphrey Several other
proSpectors followed the wagon tracks"
of these two men and also staked /
claims on Butte Hill. The first house
on the present site of Butte was erect /
ed IN the summer Of 1864 by Humphrey |
and four other prospectors. 1t was
located on what is now Quartz street,
and was sold a few years later to
Robert Girton for 500. Chasteen A.
Humphrey, brother of one of the
founders Of Butte, rode horseback from
Nevada City, Calf, to Butte in the
Things moved slowly for Butte of
those early days and when David NJ
Upton arrived in September, 1866,
there were no buildings where the
town site Is now but in Buffalo gulch,
near Centervi1le, there were about 40
men and women, and they thought
they had the biggest town in the noun
tains"
Buttes first smelter was built in the
Of 1867, in an effort to work
the ores which had been uncovered In
the search for gold-bearing quartz.
Some copper matte was shipped to
Swansea Wales, but the enterprise
was soon abandoned, for the ore had
10 be hauled to Fort Benton by bull
team, thence down the Missouri river
oy river boat.
The failure of the smelter business :
lid not slow down mining activity and s
rs a placer camp Butte reached its i
first apex Of prosperity In 1857 But /
water was scarce and a dry season in :
1859 caused many of the miners to /
cave the camp. Also, the sands of Sill
yer Bow creek had been banned out" I
Butte's population in 1870 was only !
4v.4n
quartz mining was renewed and miners I
began to pour into the camp once I
more.
In the fall of the year 1874, one of !
Butte'S earliest proSpectoTS, William L. !
Farlin, returned from the diggings in /
idaho. The law of congress by which :
III quartz claims unrepresented for 4
year were to revert to the public do 7
main was about to 60 into effect. Jan 2
!, 1875, was the date when claims un- 7
represented could be relocated under +
his act. Mr.. Farlin had noted some :
promising claims during his first res !
dence in Butte. When he went to ;
IDAHO, he took samples of ore from 3
heSe claims with him. He had the :
amples assayed at Owyhee, found S
hem rich in silver Upon his return =
o Butte, he kept quiet about what he (
new and at midnight, Dec 81, 1874, 4
le relocated the Travonia and several y
'ther claims that had been abandoned =
" their original owners.
Mining news spreads quickly and Z
nysteriously and the news of Butte's 9
ich silver lodges spread quickly to Y
ther camps. Miners swarmed into the 3
rea and an era Of claim jumping fol- 2
owed. More substantial buildings were 3
rected. The first miners union was 4
ormed June IS, 1873, and to this day y
hat date Is holiday in Butte-Miners' !.
Jnion Day. Butte has always been a =
reat union town. q
Perhaps the saga of Butte's rise s
rom a frontier mining camp of the Z
ate sixties to the greatest mining city q
4 the Americas can best be told by q.
racing the careers Of the three men p
mo played outstanding parts in the in u
ustrial life of the city during its u
era. The first Of these three el
len to arrive was William A. Clark,
nd he outlived both of the others. al
Born In Connellsville, Pa, In 1889, b
If. Clark had been a farm boy in II
ennSVlVania and T0Wa a cniInfrV al