USA > Missouri > Missouri the center state, 1821-1915 > Part 30
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The Midland Company had over three hundred men employed at the furnace, nearly a hundred more at the ore banks and about three hundred cutting wood and making charcoal. A community of two thousand was supported directly by this industry. The employes were paid in cash, but between pay-days they could obtain a statement of what was due them, and this statement could be used for trading at the company's store. To that store people came to buy from all parts of the county, and the business often ran up to $1,000 a day. Employes of the company lived in neat cottages scattered in the woods. Many of them had been there for years. They had carpets on the floors, flowers in the windows and organs in the parlors. Their daughters attended such seminaries as that of Mrs. Anna Sneed Cairns. Perhaps nowhere else in the country was there another community of iron makers so admirable as the Midland.
The Camden County Experiment.
Governor McClurg's venture in iron production is part of the history of Cam- den County. In the days when Linn Creek was the metropolis for South Central Missouri, McClurg's store did an immense business. At that time twelve steam- boats navigated the Osage River. Above Linn Creek the river makes a mighty bend. The distance around by water is sixty miles. Across the neck of land is only three miles. In this rough region are vast quantities of iron ore. Red hematite and blue hematite abound without limit. No prophet was on hand to warn the governor of the changing conditions of transportation then impending. No expert was present to point out that ore and charcoal would not alone make iron smelting profitable. Governor McClurg put $50,000 of his profits from merchandising into an iron furnace, and the plant stands there at a place shown on the county maps as Iron Town. Ore to the amount of 100 tons or more is piled up. The Osage runs by, carrying railroad ties to civilization, but no pigs of iron. Iron Town is a monument of misdirected enterprise in the wilder- ness. It was built too early. The day may be nearer than appears when the coal banks of Morgan and the great deposits of marvelously pure iron ore of Camden will get together, when smelters side by side will turn out lead from the Cambrian formation and zinc from the great fissures, and Camden will take an important place in the world of metal production.
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South of White River, in Taney County, is another Iron Mountain. Nobody knows how much of the great hill is ore, because Iron Mountain waits, like many other resources of the Ozarks, upon practical development. But scattered over the mountain are what seem to be rocks and bowlders, but which upon examina- tion are discovered to be masses of red hematite. Specimens of this ore have been tested, and analyses have shown high average of purity. Many years ago a com- pany was formed with a plan to barge this iron down White River 300 miles to the nearest railroad point. A road was built to the river, warehouses were erected, some tons of ore were hauled and stored. With that the exploitation of the Taney County iron ore ended.
The Twelve Minerals of Mine La Motte.
In 1838 the owners of the Mine La Motte discovered that they had something valuable besides lead. Copper sulphides in paying quantity were found, but were not worked on any extended scale. In 1844 Henry Marie took some specimens to England. When he returned his brother came with him, and they, with Janis and Valle, opened up a copper mine within two miles of Fleming's lead furnace. Work was carried on from 1845 to 1848, only three years, and in that time the net profits from the copper taken out were $150,000. The Maries sent their product to England. Janis and Valle sold their copper in Missouri and cleared $98,000.
No fewer than twelve minerals were found in the tract of Mine La Motte. They were gold, silver, nickel, copper, bismuth, antimony, zinc, lead, manganese, iron, arsenic and cobalt. Not all of these were produced in paying quantities. As late as 1876 mineralogists claimed for Madison County the largest and richest deposits of nickel and cobalt in the world. In three years, from 1872 to 1875, the shipments of nickel from the county amounted to $500,000.
The Exploitation of Copper.
About 1849 two St. Louisans of scientific attainments prospected Franklin County for copper. They were Archibald Gamble and Edward Bredell. They employed a practical smelter man and built a furnace near the location of Stan- ton's gunpowder industry. The plan of operation was to have the farmers mine the ore from the scattered ledges, haul it to the furnace and sell it for a stipu- lated price per ton, following the custom of early lead mining in adjacent counties. Mr. Gamble and Mr. Bredell satisfied themselves that there was much ore in the southern part of Franklin County. At the first trial the furnace chilled and the practical smelter man accounted for it by the change of the wind to the north. Other St. Louisans went into copper mining in Franklin County. The Stanton mine was opened, a furnace was built, a pump was put in. Copper to the value of thirty thousand dollars was produced and hauled by wagon to St. Louis.
Great hopes were entertained for several years about copper deposits in Mis- souri. The St. Louisans, exploiting the Stanton mine, were sanguine. Copper produced from this mine was put on exhibition at the real estate office of Leffing- well and Elliot in 1854. This optimistic announcement was made: "The pro- prietors regard it as a lode of great power, and believe that their explorations warrant the conclusion that the copper region of Missouri will reward capital, skill and labor better than the Lake Superior region. The furnace of the Stanton
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company converts their ore at one process into copper wanting only from three to five per cent of absolute purity. So that by this process, pig copper is produced at one heating in Missouri equal to that produced by five processes in the great Swansea works in Wales, or in the Baltimore smelting establishments. The cop- per produced at the Stanton mine is said to command in the eastern markets the very highest price of pig copper. In the same county of Franklin and in Wash- ington there are other valuable mines known to exist, and in many other places on the Southwestern railroad, where the indications are just as good, the land can now be purchased for two and one-half dollars an acre. There is a mine belonging to Andrew Park which promises to be very rich. This mine was first discovered in 1846, by some persons who, having heard a tradition that early Spanish miners had found silver in that region, determined to sink a shaft in quest of that metal, and in doing so discovered red oxide of copper of very rich quality. By the removal of a few inches of surface earth, some 7,000 pounds was taken out, pronounced to be a combination of sulphuret, red oxide, gray cop- per and malachite. This ore was shipped to Baltimore and smelted there with very satisfactory results."
Dr. Silas Reed was given the credit of starting in St. Louis the interest in this near-by copper mining. St. Louisans were told that "ores of copper in many localities have been found associated with the ores of iron, and very often in the same vicinage have been found extensive deposits of lead; and it is believed that many of the iron mines containing massive ore are the surface gossan of copper mines. All of the practical miners from Cornwall and Cuban mines who have visited and examined the copper mines opened in Missouri, recognize the gossan as the unfailing sign of lodes of copper at the depth of from one hundred to three hundred feet." Predictions were made that the Southwest Branch, now the Frisco, would derive a great deal of revenue from the copper mining along its line within one hundred miles of St. Louis. A shipment of fifteen or twenty tons was made over the road while it was being built through Franklin County. Discoveries were made also along Current River. New York as well as Missouri capital was inter- ested in these copper prospects.
Coal Banks of Morgan and Saline.
The Ozarks abound in things that puzzle the wise men of science. Morgan County seems to be especially favored in the direction of resources which by some of the earlier rules of mineralogy ought not to be there. The geologist who told the people of the county that they need not expect to find coal in paying quantities shall be nameless. If the people wanted to be retributive they could put the mis- taken scientist on a four-horse wagon, haul him into a tunnel of coal and carve his name on a solid bank 70 feet high. They do not talk of veins of coal in Morgan. They say "banks." They think it must have been deposited by a chain of deep lakes. How otherwise is it possible to conceive of the formation of such bodies of coal?
This Morgan County coal comes in the bituminous and the cannel formations. The bituminous is in the largest bodies, but there is a bank of cannel coal 28 feet thick. The cannel coal can be taken out in slabs and sticks. It can be split with a hatchet like a piece of well-grained pine. If a hot fire is wanted the slabs of cannel coal are placed on edge. If a slow fire is the purpose the cannel is laid
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flat and smolders slowly as planks would. Sandwiched in the crevices are found both lead and zinc ore. This last statement will be questioned by the students who know all about geology and mineralogy as read in the books. It was made to Prof. Jenney, the expert on lead and zinc.
"Oh, no! You are mistaken," Prof. Jenney said. By way of reply the Morgan County man went into his cellar and brought up a slab of the cannel coal. Prof. Jenney split the coal, examined the mineral in the cracks, and said he wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it. The professor admitted that zinc was some- times found in coal, but he was of the opinion that lead couldn't occur there. Nevertheless, examination of this Morgan County cannel showed layers of lead an eighth of an inch thick. This cannel coal burns to a pure white ash. It is so clean that it can be handled without gloves, and leaves no black marks.
What has been called "a mountain of coal" is found on the Blackwater in Saline County., It is only six feet below the surface of the ground. Distance from the railroad has delayed development. Prospecting has shown a thickness of sixty feet of coal.
Moberly's Shale Banks.
Some years ago a canny Scotchman, James Sanderson by name, settled in Moberly. He established a brickyard of the ordinary kind just outside of the city, and began to make the common building and pavement product from the surface clay. One day he approached citizens with a proposition that they form a stock company to build a kiln and utilize the shale which he had found and experimented with. He told them he could turn out a vitrified brick that would do for street paving. The proposition was entertained, but nobody showed any disposition to corner the stock. Subscriptions of $100 were about the average. The stock was passed around in blocks of about that size. Public spirit rather than the expectation of a good thing promoted organization. Sanderson went to work. His paving brick made from the shale turned out to be exactly the proper thing for the paving of streets of cities of the class where economy was a chief con- sideration, and where the traffic did not demand the heaviest material. Vitrified brick has taken its place with asphalt and granite, as of proven value. It is not so costly as either. Where asphalt can not be afforded and where the traffic does not demand granite, vitrified brick comes in to make possible the luxury of well-paved streets. Moberly proved on her own streets the utility of the vitrified brick, and then began to supply other cities, as the fame of Sanderson's kilns spread. Shale is blasted out of the inexhaustible banks and hauled by tramway to the place where it is pulverized, pressed and burned. The product is shipped to all parts of Missouri. There is scarcely a city or town of considerable size which does not show some of the Moberly paving. Railroad officials have demonstrated that this vitrified brick paving is better than the usual plank platform and have adopted it widely.
Missouri Manganese.
In September, 1914, the Globe-Democrat published this information: "Fer- romanganese, a necessary ingredient for producing many forms of steel, was mainly an import from Europe prior to this war. The price within the last few weeks has jumped from $30 to $100 a ton. Manganese ore, from which ferroman-
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ganese is obtained, is found in considerable quantity in various parts of the northern part of Shannon County, Mo., in the iron and copper districts there. This region, hitherto inaccessible for want of transportation facilities, is now being entered by a railroad coming north through Shannon County, its present tempo- rary terminus being about thirty miles south of Salem, Dent County, to which town it is coming, to connect there with the Frisco Railroad, and thus give direct railroad connection with St. Louis. So this mineral region, with its manganese, iron and copper ores, is now ready for the prospector and investor to enter and annex to St. Louis as a new field for industries based on these ores."
Rapid Review and Expansive Prophecy.
The Missouri Ozarks have yielded over $500,000,000 in lead, zinc and iron. This was the calculation made in 1914 by H. J. Cantwell, than whom there is, probably, no better living authority on the mineral production of this region. Cantwell was brought to Missouri from Pennsylvania by his parents when he was four years old. He was one of the earliest exploiters of the Flat River district. He opened the first deep mine for lead south of Mine La Motte in Madison County. He sunk the first diamond drill hole in Washington County. In a rapid review of what has been and may be realized Mr. Cantwell said :
"Take the eastern tier of counties, consider their endowment in mineral wealth, aside from the precious metals, and match them elsewhere on the habitable globe, if you can! Commence at the first county south of St. Louis: Jefferson, with her known zinc deposits at Frumet, unworked for the past forty years; Valle mines, where no more modern devices than pick, shovel and hand windlass have ever been applied, yielding by these several mil- lions of dollars in lead values; the extensive kaolin deposits near Hillsboro, from whence the crude unwashed material has been shipped for years to eastern manufacturers; the extensive and valuable glass sand deposits utilized at Crystal City only ; Franklin county, rich in lead, iron pyrites and fire clays; Washington county, which has produced more than $10,000,000 in lead from 'gophering' in the clay only, although the deeper lead deposits have been proven to exist and, although many reliable experts predict this county will eventually prove to be the most valuable of all of the lead fields of the world. Here is the most pro- ductive baryta region known, the deposits being at the surface, but most of the ore is shipped crude and but little even washed in the county. This county also has known deposits of zinc carbonates, and in it and the adjoining county of Crawford are valuable iron deposits, unworked.
"St. Francois county, great in the production of lead, but her iron industry neglected or suspended. Iron county, with many workable iron deposits and her wonderful granite quarries, idle. Ste. Genevieve county, becoming famous for the lime and cement materials now beginning to be utilized, but her copper deposits unworked. Madison county, with at least forty square miles of limestone deposits at the base of which, in zones of fracture, lie lenticular bodies of copper, nickel and cobalt sulphides, having a gross value of more than $15 per ton. Many acres capable of yielding gross values of more than half a million per acre awaiting the quickening touch of the hand of capital to change these baser metals into coin of the realm.
"Shannon county, with known copper deposits. Dent and Reynolds, with bodies of iron ore; Wayne and Butler, with millions of tons of brown iron ore face, only requiring the application of methods of mining well tested elsewhere; cheap transportation, cheap coke and modern blast furnaces to become great commercial producers.
"Remember that these counties are those that lie on or near a railroad; that the existence of these great treasures are visible to all with eyes to see; that their intrinsic values are proven by many official and authoritative publications, many of these publications covered with the dust of two generations, but they are all found in the public libraries, and the methods of utilization are all applied elsewhere and that these methods are shown in the
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current industrial and technical journals and no 'secret processes' or patented methods are required.
"Remembering also that the same geological conditions, which made this unique mineral- ization of this region possible, exist in the entire range of the Ozark hills on to Joplin, and one may reasonably wonder that if this known accessible region, which contains so many varied and valuable mineral resources, is undeveloped, what may not be the possibilities of the region not accessible. Further, if the known resources are not developed, will not develop- ment of the known bring here, as it elsewhere has, knowledge of further and different resources ?
"Tungsten, vanadium, uranium, asbestos, plumbago, manganese, were found in this region when they had no value except for cabinet specimens, and the region has not been searched since. Copper was produced in Madison county, Shannon county, Ste. Genevieve county and Franklin county in quantities of many thousands of dollars, when the entire annual production of the United States did not equal the present weekly consumption. Ilasselmeyer had a zinc furnace in Washington county when the total zinc consumed in the United States in a year would not pay one day's expenses of a modern zinc furnace. The first iron furnace in the State was near Caledonia before Iron Mountain was worked.
"The first diamond-drill hole sunk in the State, perhaps the first in the West, was sunk before 1869 at Kingston, in Washington county, and disseminated lead was there and then discovered when the only method of concentration was the hand crusher and the hand jig, and the ore was thought to be too low grade for these primitive processes. These resources of this Ozark region are all there.
"No man now need discover them. They were discovered-all of them-in the only period when Missourians really recognized the greatness of their State and when they believed themselves big enough to develop them-in that glorious decade before the Civil war when giants walked the earth and when the Missouri Ozarks were full of them.
"There is not a single hamlet in the Ozark hills but could, if inhabited by such courageous burghers as now inhabit industrial Germany, from their own resources, develop in the immediate neighborhood, a mining industry from the undeveloped wealth, or a manufactur- ing industry from the already developed raw materials which would make princes of all them, and provide employment for thousands for years to come. This is not extravagant fancy ; this is not the 'boosting' of a prospectus; these statements are provable to any man who has intelligence enough to read and understand the testimony of men eminent in the scientific world and who has sufficient industry to acquaint himself with what is being done elsewhere in the world.
"Missourians, the sons of those who saw these possibilities before the Civil war, have made fame and fortune in the western fields and Alaska. The generation after the war had no opportunity to do anything in this region, but the present generation has now the oppor- tunity to do what their grandfathers would have done had the war not interrupted the development of the region. With a thousand rills and rivers to furnish cheap electrical power, the many improvements in methods of mining and reducing ores, the present methods of scientific prospecting, with an era soon upon us when capital can be secured for the operation of every basic industry, this region must come into its own and be recognized as it really is-the most favorable area for the development of commercial mines in the Union."
Forty-eight Miles of Surprise.
A ride on the forty-eight miles of railroad from Riverside to Doe Run is a continuous strain on the surprise faculty. For a few miles the route is along the river. Then comes Herculaneum, not the Herculaneum of three generations ago, but the entirely new Herculaneum of today. Time was when Herculaneum was one of the notable river cities between St. Louis and New Orleans. A popu- lation of 1,500 was assembled there when that number meant the second city in the State. The second lodge of Free Masons in Missouri was chartered for Her- culaneum. It is even said that ambitious residents agitated the establishment of the state capital at Herculaneum. Times changed. The glory of the river com-
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merce waned. Bearing inland from the river, the Iron Mountain Railroad builders made a city of De Soto. Hillsboro became the county seat and thither went the charter for the Masonic lodge. Herculaneum became the abode of the bats. It passed to worse than innocuous desuetude. It vanished to foundation stones and decaying timbers. Then came, a few years ago, the construction of this railroad, as part of the evolution of the disseminated lead ore district. On the ruins of Herculaneum were erected reduction works and on the most sightly elevation were placed the rows of neat cottages for the smelter men. The iron horse whistles oftener at the front door of Herculaneum than ever did the palatial steamboats of the river's best days.
Below the rebuilt Herculaneum the route is inland over many acres of dairy farms, where fine herds furnish milk daily for St. Louis consumption. The train travels between Festus and Crystal City, the home of the plate glass industry of Missouri, where the silicate hills are furnishing raw material for the furnaces, above which tall chimneys belch black smoke. Plattin Valley is traversed and then beyond Big River, which circles among these Ozark foot hills in long search for its outlet by the Meramec, comes in view the fine high school of Bonne Terre, with its environment of railroad tracks and mine shafts and mill buildings and the city of 5,000 contented people.
Below Bonne Terre the road seems to sprangle in several directions to reach mining localities. It is down the main line that the most inspiring sight is found .. With the smoke from St. Joe mine and mill still to be seen behind, the traveler crosses a divide and overlooks the Flat River basin. Off to the right, half hidden by the heavy forest growth, are the works of the Desloge Lead Mining Company. Desloge is one of the first stations, and about it is a community of several hundred people. The company has its own switch system connecting with the railroad. Beyond the town of Desloge is that of Leadville, the next railroad station, and of about the same population. From Desloge the stations are frequent and settle- ment is almost continuous. After Leadville come St. Francis, Flat River, Federal, Columbia, Central, Elvins, Doe Run and half a dozen other communities clustering about the works.
The future of the disseminated lead district of Missouri is not a subject for speculation. It is assured. Millions of dollars have been and are being put into plants which are expected to be in operation far beyond the time of this genera- tion. Immense bodies of ore have been blocked out by the drill, so that the supply to run these plants for many years is "in touch" if not in sight. From time to time new bodies of ore are discovered. Localities which a few years ago were not known as lead lands have changed hands at prices which tell as plainly as the cores what the drill has found. The policy which has proved so successful with the pioneer company, the St. Joe, is steady operation with the machinery and methods approved by many years' experience. Whether lead goes up or goes down, the volume of production is about the same month after month and year after year. This is the policy of the district. To supply the present fuel needs is required hundreds of thousands of tons of coal annually. This is brought in by Riverside and distributed to the different plants. The assembly of the raw material, principally ore and fuel, and the disposition of the residue, the so-called "chats," tax the railroad equipment, although each company, except the St. Joe and the Doe Run, has its own switch tracks and outfit. Upon the forty-eight Vol. I-14
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