Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington, Part 118

Author:
Publication date: 1904
Publisher: Spokane, Wash. : Western History
Number of Pages: 992

USA > Washington > Chelan County > Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington > Part 118
USA > Washington > Ferry County > Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington > Part 118
USA > Washington > Okanogan County > Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington > Part 118
USA > Washington > Stevens County > Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington > Part 118

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

The Stehekin district, with a story of a lost mine, dating back to 1880, has a mining his- tory commencing in the year 1885. Along the summit of the range it extends northward from Cascade Pass, including the entire water shed of the Stehekin river. On Doubtful lake, north of the pass, discoveries began and these extended to Horseshoe Basin and along each side of the Stehekin canyon, up Park and Bridge creeks, flowing from the right, and thence up Agnes and Company creeks to the left. The high grade ore from these proper- ties would pay a handsome profit on shipment to the smelter. Of two kinds is the ore-one carrying galena, gray copper and sulphides in which silver is the principal value, although there is a large admixture of gold; the other carrying iron and copper sulphides under the

familiar iron cap, which is a sure sign of min- eral deposit throughout the Cascades, or in the Gold Range.

Down by the glaciers of Horseshoe Basin galena ledges have been traced twelve miles eastward to the head of Bridge creek, twenty- three and one-half miles by trail from Stehekin. They are found parallel, or associated with the ledges of pyritic ore in a formation of granite and porphyry. Of the Tiger group of claims owned by H. O. Hollenbeck, Van Smith, Pro- fessor Piper, George Young, H. Willis Carr and others, three claims are on a ledge fifty feet wide, running northeast and southwest, near the head of the north fork. Three pay streaks are shown by the croppings, 24, 18 and 6 inches wide, two of them carrying galena, steel galena, gray copper and sulphurets, as shown in a 20-foot open cut, while a 12-foot shaft shows the third to change from large ga- lena crystals to sulphides. Assays range from 103 to 176 ounces of silver, and uniformly show about $24 in gold. Three other claims are on a parallel ledge five feet wide, in which . a twenty foot tunnel shows a 14-inch streak of white iron assaying $6 gold and $8 silver, besides copper.

Of the Wenatchee District Mr. L. K. Hod- ges says :

The city of Wenatchee is known chiefly as the outfitting point for the districts in Okanogan county north of it, being the connecting point of the Great Northern Railroad and the Columbia river steamer line, but it also has the making of a mining camp at its back door, within three miles of it by wagon road. The ore is low grade bearing gold and a small proportion of silver, but it is in such large deposits that, if worked on a considerable scale with modern methods and skill- ful management, it would pay handsome dividends. The deposit is a great dike of porphyry in which are numerous veins of quartz, and extends over three miles in an almost due north and south course from Squil- chuck creek to Canyon No. 2, directly back of the town among the foothills. The principal work in this district has been done on the Golden King group of three claims, located by M. J. Carkeek, of Seattle, and is owned by the Golden King Mining Company, of Se- attle.

The dike is a veritable landmark in the Squilchuck

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canyon, standing out on the north side, one mile from the Columbia, from 100 to 150 feet wide between walls of bastard granite rising in a great cluster of pinnacles and spires of bright red, yellow and brown to a height of 150 feet above the road and growing taller toward the crest of the hill until it reaches an elevation of 500 feet. The whole dike is more or less mineralized, the porphyry carrying about $2 gold besides silver, but the best value is in the quartz stringers, which range in width from six inches to seven feet, and have given assays ranging from $4 to $16. The dike is so thor- oughly mineralized from the very surface that it could be mined very cheaply, in fact it could be quarried out, and with a large stamp mill reduced profitably.

The Peshastin and Negro creeks districts Mr. Hodges describes as follows :

About midway between the two transcontinental railroads which traverse the state of Washington from east to west lies the district where the first stamp mill in the state was erected. Taking the Northern Pacific train from Seattle Cle-elum, 122 miles, one can ride or drive to Blewett, the center of the district, a distance of thirty-two miles over a good road, or taking the Great Northern train to Leavenworth, 150 miles, one can go over a good road fourteen miles to the mouth of Ingalls creek, and thence by trail five miles to the camp farthest up Negro creek or four miles to Blewett. A road four miles long would close the only gap in the road between the two railroads.

The mineral belt through which Peshastin creek flows northward into the Wenatchee river, receiving Ingalls and Negro creeks as tributaries from the west, and Ruby creek from the east, has a totally different geological formation from the country north and south of it. To the north, from a line cutting across the Chi- wah river some distance above its mouth is a sandstone formation which terminates on the northwest about the mouth of Icicle creek, a granite formation lying north of it up the Chiwah river to Red Hill. About seven miles up the Peshastin this sandstone gives way to a series of strata of metamorphic rocks, including serpentine, syenite, diorite, magnesian limestone, talc, porphyry, porphyritic quartzite and granite. In the dikes of porphyritic quartzite occur ledges of nickel, silver and copper ore and some gold with gouges of talc, the dikes having a general trend from northwest to southeast, but bending generally more to an east and west line. On the one side this belt terminates two miles southeast of Blewett, and to the west it gradually widens toward the base of Mount Stuart, which peak it includes. It extends into the Swauk district, where it forms a basin and swings to the northwest.

Mineral was first discovered in this district about 1860 by a party of miners returning from Fraser river, but they only worked the placers and gradually drifted away. One of them, a negro, took out $1,100 in a season,

from the bars at the mouth of Negro creek, giving that stream its name. It was not until 1874 that the first quartz ledge was discovered. In that year John Shafer located the Culver on a ledge of free milling ore near the summit of the mountain dividing the Negro creek canyon on the one side from the Culver draw on the other, but was a short time behind Samuel Culver, who located the Polepick on a parallel ledge. Culver then took the Humming Bird on another ledge, James Lock- wood staked out the Bobtail adjoining it, and John Olden and Peter Wilder took the Fraction; John Olden and Samuel Culver the Little Culver. All these claims except the Polepick and Little Culver were shortly after- ward bought by James Lockwood and his son, E. W. Lockwood, and H. M. Cooper, who erected a six-stamp mill with one Frue Vanner, which they operated by water power. The mill reduced eight tons of ore in twenty-four hours, and the cleanup from the first nine days' run was $2,100. The company also had an arrastre with a capacity of one thousand pounds a day, of which the product averaged $70 a day. After running the mine and mil for eight years this company sold it to Thomas Johnson, who shut down after a short run. Then arose the dispute as to the ownership of the prop- erty which culminated in the killing of William Dona- hue by Thomas Johnson in 1896, but this did not pre- vent the sale in 1891 to the Culver Gold Mining Com- pany. This company erected a ten-stamp mill with four Woodbury concentrators and stretched a bucket cable tramway from the mill to the Culver mine, one-fifth mile. Some ore was shipped before the completion of the mill, one lot returning $800 a ton.

In 1892 the Culver Company sold out to the Blew- ett Gold Mining Company, composed of Seattle capi- talists, and this company set to work to thoroughly de- velop the mine and mill its ores.

On the Culver group are three parallel ledges be- tween walls of serpentine and porphyry, that of the Culver itself being from two to ten feet wide, with oc- casional bunches of ore sixteen feet wide. The body of the ore is a reddish gray quartz and there occasion- ally occurs on the walls a transparent green talc with white crystals, through which, as in a magnifying glass, the flakes of free gold can be plainly seen. The Hum- ming Bird and Bobtail ledge is two to four feet wide, and contains a blue quartz carrying a larger percentage of sulphurets than the Culver. The Fraction ledge is about the same size and character and runs higher in iron sulphurets. As depth is attained the free gold runs out and the ore becomes base. The value runs all the way from $8 to $20 in free gold with occasional pockets as high as $700, and it carries a trace of silver. The group has been developed by a number of tunnels ag- gregating several thousand feet, the longest of which is 600 feet attaining a depth of 300 feet on the Humming Bird.

The company erected a twenty-stamp mill at the mouth of Culver draw, near the old Lockwood mill,

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allowing space for twenty more stamps, and had four Woodbury concentrators, the whole plant having boiler capacity for forty stamps. The bucket tramway was moved to the new site and the mill equipped with every labor-saving appliance, including self-feeders to the stamps. A steam saw-mill was erected three miles up the creek with a capacity of 10,000 feet a day, and sawed lumber for the mill buildings, the mine and repairs to the road and bridges over which the machinery was hauled from Cle-elum. The development of the mine and operation of the mill were continued together by the company until 1894, when the system of leasing sections of the mines to small associations of miners was inaugurated, and has been continued with good results ever since, it being found that when miners have a direct interest in the product they sort the ore more carefully than when working for wages. During 1896 the mill reduced 2,469 tons of Culver ore, from which the extraction averaged $12.62 a ton, and 473 tons of customs. The product of the Blewett company in bul- lion was about $60,000 for the year 1896.

It having been found that with the most careful milling the arsenic in the ore floured the quicksilver on the plates and thus prevented it from catching the gold; also that much of the fine copper sulphides escaped in the slime in the shape of foam, the tailings have been reserved in dams, with a view to further treatment by some improved process. This was established in the summer of 1896 and is a small cyanide plant erected under the direction of A. J. Morse for Rosenberg & Company, one of the parties of lessees. It has a capacity of ten tons a day and throughout the winter has been treating the tailings, of which 600 tons, containing from $3 to $30 in gold per ton, had accumulated and had ex- tracted from 70 to 75 per cent of the value. This plant has demonstrated the presence in the ores of substances which prevent close saving of their values and some modern process such as the cyanide will be finally adopt- ed by the Blewett company.

In 1878 the Culver ledge was traced over the ridge to Negro creek and the Olympia group of five claims was located on it, its width averaging about four feet. These claims were sold to the Cascade Mining Company, which ran a tunnel southward on a stringer to the right of the ledge on one claim and struck two bodies of ore, which it followed to the wall. On another claim it ran a sixty-foot cross-cut tunnel in the direction of the ledge, but did not tap it, and ran a tunnel about fifty feet on the ledge near the summit, but it has since caved in. A two-stamp Huntington mill was hauled from The Dalles, on the Columbia, by team and over the mountain by block and tackle. It was erected without concentrators, and was run by water power in the expectation of sav- ing the free gold. It was run for a couple of months in 1880 and reduced about fifty tons of ore, but the assay value of from $10 to $70 a ton was chiefly in sulphides and very fine gold, so that only about $4.50 a ton was saved and the small percentage of copper was also lost.

A year or two later, owing to the death of Marshall Blinn, the organizer of the company, the mill stopped and has never resumed. For a time the property was under bond to Edward Blewett, who ran a tunnel 200 feet in an endeavor to trace the ledge into the Culver, of which it has the characteristics and the same value in free gold, and several open cuts have been made, showing ore in a number of places. The Culver ledge spreads out toward the summit, and is divided by horses of syenite, which rock forms the hanging wall, and then disappears.

Much of the gold in early days was lost by the mill- ing of ore in arrastres, three of which were built and one of which is now in operation at intervals. When it is remembered that the fine copper sulphides which go off in foam cannot be saved even by cyanide and that only pan amalgamation is effective with them, one can imagine how much value is lost by such a rude mill as an arrastre. In the spring of 1896 the Blewett company sold the ten-stamp mill to Thomas Johnson, who had been milling the Polepick ore in it, with the addition of canvas tables. This mine has a quartz ledge varying from eighteen to thirty-six inches, and occasionally widening to five feet. Assays range from $10 to $132 in free gold, and average about $27. Development be- gan with a cross-cut tunnel 237 feet from which an upraise was made 147 feet, in ore all the way. A drift has been run 100 feet west from the upraise at the 100-foot level, on which stoping is being done, and an- other upraise has been started. Adjoining this claim on another ledge three feet wide is Polepick No. 2, owned by Dexter, Shoudy & Company, on which a tunnel has been run eighty feet, showing ore which assays $28.

On the Culver draw is the Phoenix, on which D. T. Cross and John F. Dore, of Seattle, and the late William Donahue tapped a five-foot ledge of brown quartz at a depth of 100 feet by cross-cutting 125 feet. They have run three levels 100 feet long at intervals of twenty feet and have stoped the ore from the highest level to the surface, having taken out in all 1,000 tons, which was milled at the Blewett mill and returned about $20 gold on the average. Some of this ore was reduced in 1895 in a small mill with four 250-pound stamps and a side- jigger concentrator, which was erected by the Califor- nia Milling & Mining Company, but the cost of opera- tion was out of proportion to the possible product and it was shut down. The Peshastin is on a three-foot ledge, also on the Culver draw, on which William Donahue, Dore and Cross ran a tunnel and shipped some ore some years ago. In 1894 they bonded the claim to George W. Martin, of Minneapolis, who also leased the Blewett mill and built a chute down the hill to it. He ran through about 100 tons, but it was so poorly sorted that it did not pay for milling and the company canceled the lease. He then gave up and Dexter, Shoudy & Company bought the mine. They ran a tunnel through the Frac- tion tunnel into the west end of the claim and took out

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about eighty tons of ore, which yielded about $21 a ton in free gold and eight tons of concentrates worth $100 a ton.

On what was supposed to be the Culver ledge J. L. Warner and his associates have the Lightning, with the White Elephant and Pine Tree on parallel ledges. They have simply kept up assessment work, driving a thirty-foot tunnel on the Pine Tree.

A short distance above the Culver draw, on the west side of the canyon, Dexter, Shoudy & Company are working the Black Jack on a ledge of blue quartz two to five feet wide. The same parties own the Eureka, on the other side of the canyon, on a three-foot ledge. which assays $16.64 gold, and on which a tunnel has been driven forty feet. The owners bought the arrastre built by John Shafer sixteen years ago, and are milling the ore in it. The Polepick, Peshastin, Black Jack and the Johnson mill have been bonded to parties in the east who contemplate working them together. On the Marion, Charles Donahue has three veins, one of which is eight feet wide and carries $6 in free milling and $9 concentrating ore. On the Gem is a five-foot ledge of concentrating ore which assays $8 to $16 gold and 75 cents to 54 ounces of silver. Between the Peshastin and the Gem is the Manistee, owned by William Donahue's heirs, Dore and Cross. A tunnel has been driven 140 feet on a broken horse on the surface, and the ledge has not been found in place.

Among the other mines in the Peshastin district are the Caledonia group of four claims, on three parallel ledges; the Sunset near the Tip Top, at the head of the basin, owned by Oliver Cloud and John Gilmore; the War Eagle group, about a mile up Negro creek ; the New York group, on the divide between Negro and Ingalls creeks ; the Eagle and Iowa, across the creek from the Cascade Mining Com- pany's group ; the Daisy Dean, farther up the creek, owned by the Donahue estate; the Ra- nier group of thirteen claims, with two mill sites still farther up the creek; the Montana ; the Red Butte Nos. I and 2; the Union and Dominion on Bear creek ; the P. P. Nickel, and on the north side is the Ontario.

On the south side of the creek is the Me- ridian, and next in order is the North Pole group of ten claims ; the Ivanhoe No. 5; the Cinnabar King, and on the first dike which cuts across the Peshastin is another string of claims. On the right bank are the Monarch Nos. 1 and 2, and five miles above the mouth

of Ingalls creek, is the state group of six claims.

Of the Leavenworth district Mr. Hodges says:

The last few years have proved the presence of a great mineral zone in the mountains on each side of the Chiwah Canyon, as in other parts of the Cascade range, and development is proceeding with such vigor that a year or two more should suffice to make the district a regular producer. The Leavenworth District is easily accessible from Seattle. Leaving that city on the Great Northern train, one goes to Leavenworth, 151 miles, and then goes northward by a good road to Shugart's ranch, fourteen miles, and by trail to either the Phelps basin or the Chiwah basin, thirty-eight miles in each case. These basins are one at each side of a high ridge ten miles long, known as Red Hill to distinguish it from Red Mountain in the Trail Creek district. The first dis- covery of mineral on this mountain was made in 1893 by George N. Watson, who found in a low saddle on the summit, between porphyry and granite walls, a ledge of iron pyrites four feet wide, runing a litle east of south and west of north, with a slight eastward dip. He located the Emerald, and this ledge has since been traced on the surface through a string of claims for about five miles. On a parallel ledge he and Dr. L. L. Porter, of Roslyn, have the Esmeralda, which a shaft forty-two feet deep and drifts twenty-six and twelve feet have shown to widen from eighteen inches on the surface to five feet. The ore is arsenical iron and copper sulphides and assays $14 gold, 33 per cent copper and a small amount of silver.

The largest property on the mountain is the Red Cap and Bryan groups of twenty claims, owned by the Una Mining & Milling Company, of Seattle, covering over 500 acres from the Phelps Basin southward and from the summit down to Phelps creek, with a tunnel site on the Chiwah side, two of the claims being placers in the flat at the confluence of the Chiwah and Phelps creek. The majority of claims are on the main ledge, or system of ledges, while five run continuously for 7,500 feet along the main cross ledge, which has a course south of west and north of east, breaking through granite, gneiss and syenite and dipping slightly to the northwest into the mountain. It shows well mineralized chutes of ore on the surface, carrying chalcopyrite, pyrites of iron, copper and some maganese. The lowest assay from the surface was $3.73 gold and the highest $72 gold, but copper will also form a large part of the value. The main ledge has ore bodies showing in num- erous places, heavily charged with arsenical and sul- phide ores, assaying from $3 to $180 gold. The average value of the ore through the mountain is $50 gold and silver. on the basis of a number of assays. The Bryan group lies on the sonth edge of the company's holdings, and has a ledge showing 31/2 feet of solid ore, heavily charged with copper sulphurets and native

WENATCHEE, COUNTY SEAT OF CHELAN COUNTY.

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copper in bunches. Another ledge farther up the moun- tain shows twenty-five feet of talc carrying sulphides, and will be tapped at a great depth by the cross-cut tunnel, and yet another, which cuts the red cliffs forming the rim of the basin, has been defined to a width of seven feet, with only the hanging wall found.

The company which has been most active in de- velopment until the advent of the Una was the Red Hill Mining Company, which owns ten claims on the two main ledges running across Phelps creek south of the Una property. On the Black Bear a tunnel has been run sixteen feet, showing a twelve-foot ledge carrying copper and iron sulphides, which assayed $2.51 to $29 gold and silver; on the White Swan ledge, traced for some distance to a width of eight feet, a forty-foot tun- nel showed arsenical iron assaying $12 to $18 gold, sil- ver and copper. The Red Mountain Mining Company also owns ten claims on the two main ledges, but has not as yet done any development.

Until lately but little development has been done on Red Hill, but the movement which has begun may be expected to spur owners on to show what there is be- neath the surface. Near the mouth of Maple creek Charles Allen has the Champion group of five claims, where there were evidences of the presence of white men as early as the year 1866. One ledge cropped eight to

ten feet wide, showing sulphurets, and former owners had run a cross-cut 310 feet to tap it and then aban- doned it. for lack of funds. The other ledge shows pyritic ore and is well defined to a width of fifteen feet between walls of syenite and porphyry runing southeast and northwest, assaying $4 to $7 in gold on the surface, and has an east and west spur on the summit. A cross- cut has been run about 300 feet to tap it at a depth of 250 feet.

On the Fall Creek canyon, half a mile from the Chiwah, is the Big Elephant group of six claims on a large ledge of hematite ore, defined by a twelve-foot open cut, carrying gold, silver and copper which assays on the surface $3 to $9 gold and $3.75 silver.

At the mouth of Deep creek the Deep Creek Min- ing Company has a group of thirteen placer claims and a hydraulic giant. The dirt carried about twenty-six cents a yard and about ninety per cent of the value is saved in the sluice boxes with silver plates, though the gold in the Chiwah bar is generally so fine that it can only be saved by great care and skill.

On the Rock Creek canyon, half a mile from the Chiwah, is the P. I. group of two claims. The surface showing in a gneiss blow-out of oxidized iron, carrying gold and silver, and one streak of ore assayed 444 ounces of silver. A cross-cut tunnel is in sixty-seven feet.

CHAPTER IV.

CITIES AND TOWNS.

WENATCHEE.

Wenatchee, named after the famous Indian chief, is 669 feet above sea level, in the foot- hills of the Cascade mountains, on the west bank of the Columbia, a short distance south of the mouth of the Wenatchee river, and on the main line of the Great Northern Railway. Its location on this road is about midway be- tween Spokane and Seattle.

There are a number of varying definitions ascribed to the word "Wenatchee." To the Ya- kima Indian it signifies "boiling waters," and this name was, doubtless given to the town by the natives because of the unusual commotion

caused by the Wenatchee flowing into the Col- umbia river a short distance above the town. According to the patois of other tribes "We- natchee" means "good place." But there is another romantic derivation of the name ac- cording to certain authorities, who have made a comprehensive study of Indian traditions. By them it is said that the word "Wenatchee" is derived from the romance of the "blood daugh- ter of the widowed moon." Beautiful and pos- sessed of all the graces that contribute to make maidens adorable was the young princess. At first she was admired and subsequently pas- sionately loved by the sun. But the moon, ac- cording to this fanciful legend, deemed the sun

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much too old to woo the fair princess, not yet arrived at the age when she knew her own heart, and had fixed her wish upon the mar- riage of her daughter with a younger, if less dazzling, yet handsome chief of the sky. But the wayward maiden loved the majestic sun. For a long period Mother Moon remained awake at night, keeping vigil over the move- ments of her daughter, lest the mighty sun should bear her away. Already the sun had woven for her a bridal robe of threads spun from the rainbow, and one day while the moon slumbered the princess arrayed herself in this beautiful, luminous garment, and went down to the sea, to wed with the sun. Shortly after her departure the moon awoke and hastened in pursuit of the fugitive lovers. On the moon's approach the maiden shrieked and fled to the mountains upon a bar of silvery lightning, hurled by her rejected princely lover from his place in the sky. In the dark despair of her terror the princess flung her gorgeous mantle over the mountain top and concealed herself in the heart of the cliffs, where from that evil day until the present she has dwelt in seclusion, be- wailing her sad fate. It is the Indian's belief that her melancholy, yet musical voice floats out upon the wind whenever the night is still. The robe still hangs where it was cast by the affrighted maiden, from the mountain top and over its sides, in the form of a river, and yet possessing all the hues of the rainbow, when the sun comes down through gorge and glen to caress its rippling folds. And it is called Wa-Nat-Chee, or "Robe of the Rainbow." Thus we have three distinct definitions of the word "Wenatchee," to select from: "Boiling Waters," "Good Place" and "Robe of the "Rainbow."

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Illustrated history of Stevens, Ferry, Okanogan and Chelan counties, state of Washington, Part 118

Author: Publication date: 1904 Publisher: Spokane, Wash. : Western History Number of Pages: 992

Author:
Publication date: 1904
Publisher: Spokane, Wash. : Western History
Number of Pages: 992