USA > New Mexico > Santa Fe County > Santa Fe County: The Heart of New Mexico, Rich in History and Resources > Part 4
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The apricot has given evidence of greater longevity than that of any orchard tree, with the possible exception of the pear. It is not uncommon to see very old seedling apricot trees growing in the native home places, and at Santa Fe seedling apricot trees are known to be about 200 years old. The fruit from the improved kinds is as large and as good in quality as the California apricots. The Blenheim, Moorpark, Royal, St. Ambroise and Luizet are de- sirable for home planting.
Cherries are grown on a lesser scale. The trees of both the sour and sweet groups grow well. Varieties of the sour cherries are the best bearers, but the fruit is not so large as that from the sweet varieties. The latter attain a size and flavor that are unknown to the product of eastern orchards. The sour varieties predom- inate, as they have proved to be more regular and surer bearers.
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ORCHARDS AT SANTA FE.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
profitable, and a pursuit especially adapted to those who are able to do only light out-door work.
Poultry and Poultry Products.
Annually thousands of dollars are poured into the pockets of Kansas and Nebraska farmers in payment for poultry and eggs consumed in Santa Fe County and yet the county is well adapted to the raising of poultry. It has most of the advantages with but few of the disadvantages of other sections. Insect pests are no worse, while disease is rare. Prices are high, being governed by the price of the foreign product plus the transportation charges, therefore the home product has the best of it. Eggs bring from 25 to 45 cents a dozen, and chickens from 12 to 22 cents a pound.
Dairying.
Dairying has kept pace with the demand in the vicinity of cities and towns where the products are sold in the form of milk and cream. There is not enough butter and cheese manufactured, however, to supply the needs. Outside of three dairies at Santa Fe, the dairying industry has been but slightly developed, although the profitable opportunities for modern dairy methods are very promising. The markets for farm and dairy products are nearby and pay good prices, and thousands of dollars are sent annually to Kansas, Colorado and other states for agricultural products that can be raised at home. There is not a single creamery in the County.
Fruit Preservation.
Santa Fe has an evaporator, but it has been idle the past few years, not for want of fruit or lack of market, but because no enterprising man, skilled in the business, could be found to operate it. On the Round Mountain Farm at Hobart is a small evaporator and several other orchards contemplate installing such evaporators.
Flouring Mills.
There are two modern flour mills, one at Hobart and the other at Santa Cruz. There are in addition two or three old-fashioned grist mills.
STOCK.
Next to agriculture, stock raising is the principal industry of Santa Fe County, its valleys and mesas being covered with nutri- tious grasses. The fine climate and good water are also factors that materially contribute to make stock raising profitable. There
SHEEP IN CORRAL.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
are about 60,000 sheep on the range, 10,000 head of cattle and 15,000 head of goats. The broken hill country and mountains are ideal grazing ground for goats.
Cattle.
Santa Fe County has 400,000 acres of public range and 400,000 acres more of private range. For large herds of cattle it is im- portant to have ample water, for water controls the range. But it is not difficult nor costly to secure home ranches with water rights that are adjacent and control a large extent of range. On the Pecos Forest Reserve grazing permits can be secured at slight expense and a nominal charge per head and, since the range is protected, it is the best in the Territory. It is found advisable to make more or less provision for winter feeding to guard against unexpected losses. But with feeding during winter storms, with a good home ranch and water, the cattle business proves very profit- able. The business of feeding beeves for market, while practically untried, should prove very remunerative on account of the mild climate and the abundance of forage plants.
Sheep.
The mild winters, the grassy mesas and watered valleys, the sheltered canons, help to make sheep raising very profitable. The wool produced annually is between 300,000 and 500,000 pounds, and as railroad facilities are ample, there is no difficulty in get- ting the wool clip to market. A moderate capital invested in sheep, a home ranch and ample range will bring success to the sheep raiser if he possesses good business tact and experience. In 1905, for instance, most sheep owners doubled their herds by natural increase or were paid as much for their lambs as their ewes were worth during the year 1904, receiving for the unscoured wool as high as 25 cents, and for the scoured wool, 65 cents per pound.
Goats.
Equally as profitable and as free from difficulties is the raising of goats. Especially in the foothills and on the mountain mesas, goats do better than sheep. There are many thousand acres of such pasture in Santa Fe County. Incidental to the profit from the hair of the Angora goats, their skin and their meat, they will clear land from brush and thus make it available for cultivation. The goat is very hardy, can subsist upon a range that would starve any other animal, and is free from diseases which often play havoc with other stock.
CATTLE RANGE ON PECOS RIVER AT ELEVATION OF 10,000 FEET.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
MINING.
Santa Fe County can truthfully claim to be the section in the United States where mining was first prosecuted by the white man. The fame of the county's turquoise and gold mines had probably more to do in bringing the Spaniards up the Rio Grande and Santa Fe Valleys before even the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth Rock than any other cause. Two hundred years be- fore gold was discovered in California. gold nuggets were picked up by white men in southern Santa Fe County. In the winter of 1542 Coronado and his Conquistadores, so the old chroniclers say, secured turquoise and gold in this part of New Mexico. The Mina del Tierra and the turquoise mines near Cerrillos were the first lode mines systematically worked in the Southwest and the only mines in New Mexico of which there exists any evidence of their existence before the year 1800, excepting, perhaps, the tur- quoise mines in the Burro Mountains in Grant County. But it was the placer mines in southern Santa Fe County that produced most of the gold of the period of the Spanish occupation. The Pueblo Indians, prior to the advent of the Spaniards, took gold from the superficial gravel beds south of the Ortiz Mountains. However, it is only since 1828, that the extensive areas of auriferous sands and gravels which surround the basal slope of the Ortiz Mountains have been worked continuously, and it was eleven years later that the New Placers at Golden were rediscovered by white men.
The following account of Santa Fe County's mines is principally from the pen of Professor F. A. Jones of the United States Geo- logical Survey, and is, therefore, authentic and accurate :
The New Placers.
The new placers or Silver Butte District lies to the south of Cerrillos, a town on the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway and near the west line thereof. Most mining districts in New Mexico are very indefinite in regard to their extent or area; gen- erally embracing a whole cluster or range of mountains or con- tinuous mineralized belts, regardless of size or shape. Thus it is with the New Placers ; they are supposed to include everything to the plains each way, from the north slope of the Ortiz Moun- tains south, to the plains south of South Mountain. This em- braces the Ortiz Mountains, the Old Placers, Dolores, Golden, New Placers, San Pedro and South Mountain. As a gold mining dis- trict this is the oldest in New Mexico; it is also noted for its re- cent production of copper. Nuggets of gold were no doubt picked
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CAMPING ON UPPER PECOS.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
up occasionally in this area by the Pueblo Indians, though no real mining was ever conducted in this field by those people, so far as any evidence can be obtained. It was in the year 1828 when gold was first discovered in this district. The point of discovery is what is known as the "Old Placers" and was made by a herder from Sonora. It is said that some of his herd strayed into the Ortiz Mountains, whither he went in search of it. Seeing a stone which he thought resembled some of the gold-bearing rocks of Sonora, he examined it and the rock proved to be rich in gold. News of the discovery soon spread and the excitement was intense. The most crude appliances imaginable were used; notwithstanding, considerable gold was taken out. Winter seemed to be the most favored time for mining. By melting the snow with hot rocks the miners were able to work until the dry season of the year. The ore was washed or panned out in a "batea," a sort of round wooden bowl about the same diameter of the modern gold pan. The mode of operation was first to fill the "batea" with the auriferous sands and gravels and then immersing the whole in water, and by con- stant stirring and agitation of the sands and gravels, the gold remained in the wooden vessel; this mass of black sands and gold was then reduced in a clay retort to obtain existing values, after the largest nuggets and particles of gold were first removed. Ac- cording to Prince's History of New Mexico, between $60,000 and $80,000 in gold was taken out annually between the years 1832 and 1835. The poorest years about this period yielded from $30,000 to $40,000. About this time an order was given prohibiting any person from working the mines excepting the natives. Foreign capital and energy were thus excluded, which greatly hampered and handicapped development. Under this new regime, each Mexican miner held one claim, the size of which was ten paces in all direc- tions from the main discovery pit. Any claim not kept alive by labor after a certain length of time was subject to relocation. The gold was mainly in nuggets and dust; one nugget claimed to have been found was worth $3,400, which netted the finder only $1,400. If true, this was the largest nugget ever discovered in New Mex- ico. The fineness of this gold is about 918. It would be hard to estimate the exact amount of gold taken from the "Old Placers," but it must have been considerable. Thomas A. Edison, the cele- brated American inventor, erected in 1900 an experimental plant at Dolores to operate on these rich gravels. After making several trial runs the plant was closed down indefinitely. The process was held a secret, but proved a failure. Much rich ground yet exists in this section; but owing to the Ortiz grant having passed into the
PUEBLO OF SAN ILDEFONSO,
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
hands of a syndicate, which holds it under a 99-year lease, little or no work has been done of late. This land grant covers all of the Ortiz Mountain and the best part of the placer grounds of the district; it embraces an area of ten square miles, having the Old Ortiz mine as the center of the grant. In 1833 a vein of gold- bearing quartz was discovered on the Ortiz property, which was on the famous Sierra del Oro, and now known as the Ortiz mine. The claim made by some that the Ortiz mine is the oldest lode mine in America is a mistake; Mina del Tierra, in the Cerrillos District, exceeds it by 100 years, at least. In fact, the Santa Rita mine, Grant County, is a century and a quarter old. Juan Cano, the discoverer of the Ortiz mine, came to Mexico from Spain in the early part of the Nineteenth Century. The owner of the property, named Ortiz, took into partnership a Spaniard by the name of Lopez, a person well skilled in mining of that day. Through the management of Lopez, their mining operations were successful and a considerable sum of money was realized. Wishing to retain the full production of the mine, Ortiz sought a channel to rid him- self of his Spanish colleague. The plan was carried out under the pretense of an obsolete decree which forbade any Castilian from residing or operating in New Mexico. Accordingly, Lopez was forced to leave the country.
Ortiz then formed a co-partnership with several of the officials who were connected with the expulsion of Lopez, and proceeded to work the mine. The new management not being familiar with mining operations was wholly unsuccessful; history tells us that they did not obtain "one grain of gold." This famous mine has been worked at intervals ever since its discovery, recent years excepted. The vein apparently is enclosed in syenite-porphyry ; its strike is north 13 degrees east, and its dip is 75 degrees toward the northwest. The vein outcropping is an oxidized iron-stained quartz ; below the depth of 85 feet the ore becomes base, carrying sulphurets of both iron and copper. The top portion of the vein was first worked out on account of its free milling qualities. The New Mexico Mining Company, which acquired the Ortiz grant in 1864, was first organized in 1853 and incorporated in 1858. In 1865 this company began the erection of a 20-stamp mill, which was completed in the early part of the year following. This stamp mill was the first erected in New Mexico. A certain degree of success crowned the efforts of this company: and in 1869 it added an additional 20-stamps to its plant. The ore was con- veyed from the mine to the mill by means of a tramway. After a few intermittent mill runs, the mine was closed. Some years
PUEBLO OF NAMBE.
J.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
later another company erected a large amalgamating and concen- trating plant at the mine, which was never operated successfully. The Cunningham mine, in Cunningham Gulch, near Dolores, is also well and favorably known. This is among the earliest loca- tions of the district; belonging now to the Sandia Gold Mining and Milling Company. The outcropping is immense; the width of the vein is about 600 feet and can be traced for a long distance. So bold is the outcropping that it can scarcely be classed as a vein, but more properly what miners term a "blowout." The whole of this mineralized dike consists of quartz and feldspar with rich seams or streaks passing through it in various directions. The quartz is more or less stained with oxide of iron at and near the surface; with depth the ore becomes refractory. The hanging wall is a syenite-porphyry and the foot wall a quartz-porphyry. The dip and strike of this lode conform with the Ortiz vein. Among other and familiar lodes may be mentioned the Candelaria, belong- ing to the Glorieta Company; the Brehm lode originally worked under the management of the New Mexico Mining Company, which owned the Ortiz mine; the Hutchason lode, discovered and lo- cated by J. S. Hutchason (Old Hutch), the discoverer of the Magdalena District, who was in the Old Placer District as early as 1884, and at one time owned the Candelaria mine; the Brown lode, and the Humboldt 100th; the latter lode named in honor of Humboldt's centennial. The Shoshone is also a prominent lode which has been more recently located. All of the above lodes lie near Dolores and the gold from the Old Placers evidently came from these veins, due to the action of erosion.
The New Placers, from which the district takes its name, are situated some four or five miles to the south of the Old Placers, in the Tuerto (San Pedro) Mountains. This new field was dis- covered in 1839, eleven years later than the Old Placers. Much gold has been taken from the gulches at this place. The San Laz- arus Gulch is quite a steady producer at the present time. In the vicinity of Golden, which is the newest part of the placer district, much activity is manifested and considerable success attends the efforts of modern mining. The gravels in this section average from twenty-five cents to one dollar per yard of material handled. Scarcity of water, as at the Old Placers, is a serious obstacle in working this ground. The fineness of the gold is about 920. Con- cerning the geology of the New Placer District, it seems that the trio-South Mountain, Tuertos (San Pedro) and Ortiz Mountains -are most intimately connected in their origin and had their birth in one common disturbance. The orographic line of weakness was
BRIDGE AT SANTA FE.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
north and south; on this line the three pustules of syenite-por- phyry broke through the horizontal sedimentary capping of the overlying carboniferous and cretaceous series. Generally speaking, the topography of these groups is identical. South Mountain is not so familiar to the general public as the other two groups, inas- much as this section appears to be less mineralized than the Tuerto and Ortiz localities. In the Tuertos (San Pedro), which are about three miles north of South Mountain, the sedimentary series have been partly elevated and dip about 15 degrees toward the east. The Oroquai Mountain, which is the eastern member of the Tuertos, is entirely stripped of any former sedimentary covering, exposing the rugged character of the syenite-porphyry, having its counter- part in the Ortiz Peaks, some four miles to the north. The now deserted village of Dolores stands to the northeast from the Ortiz Mountains, near their base. Gold, silver, lead, copper, iron and zinc are found in this district. In the classification of the mode of oc- currence of the ores, three divisions would seem proper: (1) De- position due to erosion, placer gravels. (2) Deposition due to descending and ascending waters and the filling in of fractured zones and true fissures, which carry gold. (3) Deposition due to contact metamorphism, from which the copper, lead, silver and zinc ores are intimately associated. In the first of these divisions the placer gold has its origin in the universally accepted manner ascribed to such deposits; that is, through disintegration of the rock-complex of the second classification, as above given.
Since there appear to be two distinct features which character- ize the occurrence of the gold under the second division, the veins are divided into fractured zones and true fissures. The first of these has no banded structure and the walls are undefined, greatly crushed and shattered. In the second case a true banded appear- ance is recognized while the walls are definite and intact. It would appear from a close inspection of the two classes of veins that the first was filled by a leaching process of descending waters; some of the seams and pockets have proven immensely rich in gold. But, in following this shattered zone down, the values grow less as the crevices grow smaller. Sulphides usually appear from seventy- five to one hundred feet below the surface. Eventually, the frac- ture becomes so small at increased depth, as to disappear apparently and the vein is completely lost or said to have "pinched out." These crushed and shattered mineralized zones are by far the most numer- ous of any types of deposit in the district. The relative position of their planes approaches perpendicularity and their general strike is nearly east and west.
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MINING NORTH OF SANTA FE.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
Under the true fissure of veins only one or two of any consequence have been noted. The most prominent of this class is found in the famous Ortiz mine. This vein is completely encased in syenite- porphyry and has a banded appearance. Descending water or lat- eral secretion is responsible for the mineralization of this and sim- ilar lodes of the district. Some very fine specimens of leaf and wire gold have been taken from the various properties. Beautiful specimens enclosed in calcite have been found in the Gold Stand- ard mine. Deposits under the third and last division are the most important in the district when viewed from a commercial stand- point. Here may be seen plainly the effect of pneumatolytic action, induced by the porphyritic magma, which was forced upward against the carboniferous limestones. The effects wrought in the overlying sedimentaries by this intrusive eruptive is very notice- able at the mines of the Santa Fe Gold and Copper Company. This property is by far the best developed of any in the district, the workings are quite extensive, embracing several miles of develop- ment. The ore is principally of a low grade chalcopyrite, and in- timately associated with garnet, lime and shales. A large smelter has been erected, but both mines and smelter are idle at present.
Massive limestones in some places have been converted into gar- net, exceeding one hundred feet in thickness, in some instances. The superficial limestones and shales at the copper mines are fre- quently penetrated by andesite dikes. It was observed that the best ore bodies were found at or just above the main porphyrite contact and along the contact planes of the andesite dikes. From the foregoing, it would appear that the segregation of ores along or near these planes of contact is largely, if not wholly, due to the action of aqueous, acid and gaseous vapors in their effort to escape from their magnetic prison; under released pressure their metallic burden was thus necessarily dropped. At the Lincoln Lucky mine the deposition of ore, no doubt, was similarly induced by the porphyrite intrusive beneath. Since the ore occurs in lime- stone along a shattered zone and not in direct contact with the porphyry, this view, at first, does not seem well taken. Upon closer investigation it will be found that cavities in the limestone have been mineralized, only where communication with the igneous mem- ber existed. On the castern and northeastern slopes of the Tuertos are some iron properties which have been not yet fully exploited. The Perry group is prominent. A company known as the Oro Quay Company has been organized to develop and exploit this group, which, in addition to extensive iron deposits, is rich in gold ore.
ESTANCIA SALT LAKE SOUTH OF SANTA FE.
SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
Some of the principal lode claims are the San Lazarus, Gold Standard, Mckinley, Lincoln Lucky, Anaconda group, Stockton group, Alto group, San Miguel, Gold King group, Hazelton group, Shamrock group (San Lazarus gulch), and the Old Reliable (on the Ortiz grant). The San Miguel is having its ore treated at the Lucas stamp mill at Golden.
The more prominent of the placer properties and operators may be enumerated as the Monte Cristo Mining Company, Baird Min- ing Company, Ltd., Morning Glory, Gold Dust, Red Bank, Santa Secivel, and Viola. On the Gold Bullion, $50,000 worth of ma- chinery was installed in 1906, including a large traction dredge. The Racine Mining Company is also installing machinery and will do extensive work on the placers.
The Cerrillos District.
From a historical standpoint no section in the United States is possessed of so much interest as the Cerrillos or Galisteo Dis- trict. The ancient workings at Mount Chalchuitl, due to the existence of turquoise in that locality, seem almost incredible considering that the work was accomplished with the crude appli- ances of the stone age, and yet such was the case. Fragments of coiled pottery, stone hammers, lichen covered rocks and trees over a century old, growing on the old dumps and in the working pits, when first brought to the notice of American explorers over fifty years ago, were then hoary with age, and prove beyond the shadow of doubt the great antiquity of mining in this region. This cele- brated district lies on the north side of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway at the little village of Los Cerrillos, near the center of Santa Fe County. The first description of the region was given by Prof. W. P. Blake, who visited the old turquoise workings in 1858. Professor Blake's article was published during the same year in the American Journal of Science. Other distin- guished scientists and writers paid visits to that section prior to the modern discovery of metallic ores. It was in the year 1879 when the modern prospector drifted into the region after the great excitement at Leadville, Colorado. The discovery of sulphide ores, zinc, lead and silver was heralded abroad and the boom started. Two town sites, Bonanza City and Carbonateville, were staked out in the early '80s and a tidal wave or mining craze swept over the district. These once thriving villages are now scarcely more than piles of rubbish and fallen walls. It was in the old hotel at Carbonateville-some of the walls are yet standing-where General Lew Wallace, when seeking recreation in the mining camp, read some of the proof sheets of "Ben Hur."
SMELTER AT CERRILLOS.
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SANTA FE COUNTY, NEW MEXICO.
Turquoise.
Mount Chalchuitl, which lies to the north of the Cerrillos railway station some three miles, is where the most extensive pre- historic and Spanish work was done. In the elaborate ancient ram- ifications of the old workings at Mount Chalchuitl, which were extensively prospected a few years ago, many stone hammers, whole vessels of ancient pottery and various crude mining implements were found. It is said that some twenty Indians were killed about 1680 by the caving of a large portion of the works. This was claimed to be one of the chief causes which led to the general up- rising of the Pueblos who shortly afterward drove the Spaniards from the country. Immense excavations and old dumps, with which are associated relics of the stone age, practically verify the antiquity of those workings. Coiled pottery, the oldest known type, is in evidence, fragments of which are found in the old dumps both at Los Cerrillos and in the Burro Mountains. It is said that a stone hammer weighing some twenty pounds, with a portion of the handle still intact about the groove, was taken from these same excavations a few years ago. These stone hammers are made from a hornblende andesite, common to the Cerrillos hills. The desic- cated condition of the drift in which this latter relic was found would account for the preservation of the wooden handle.
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