Carved into the eastern slope
of the Tushar mountains of south-central Utah, rise the walls of Bullion
Canyon. Surrounding mountain
peaks soar more than 12,000 feet above sea level. Pine Creek descends through
the gorge, losing more than 2,000 feet of elevation until it merges with
the Seview River about four miles west of the canyon. At the confluence
sits the town of Marysvale at 6,000 feet. Vegetation ranges from stands of
aspen,
ponderosa pine, and Douglas fir on the north-facing canyon slopes to sage
brush at the foot of the mountains.
Indians of the Fremont culture inhabited the region about
a thousand years ago, leaving little but petroglyphs and pottery shards.
Ute and Paiute roamed the area by the eighteenth century. The first Europeans
to discover the Tushars were Spaniards, seeking gold. An arrastra stone,
used in crude milling of gold ore, still lies next to Pine Creek, providing
mute testimony of early mining. Jedediah Smith, the first American to see
the Tushar Mountains, probably saw only their western slope. Not until the
1850s did Mormons pass through the area.
The history of Bullion Canyon is a history of mining.
From the first rush in 1868 until the mines died out a hundred years later,
men sought precious metals in the gorge. While the motive that drew men
to live in the canyon remained the same, the character of the settlements
over time changed radically, Initially wild and unrestricted, canyon settlements
grew increasingly civilized as families formed.
In the summer of 1856, George A Smith, the Second Counselor
to President Brigham Young, explored south-central Utah, following the
Sevier river until he encountered a winding canyon just south of the confluence
of Clear Creek and the Sevier. Probably to avoid that twisting obstacle,
Smith ascended what is no known as Monroe Divide and became the first recorded
member of the Mormon community to look down on the valley at the eastern
foot of the Tushars. His glance took in the ribbon of green cottonwood
foliage that spilled out of the Tushars and merged into the larger lush
strand that marked the course of the Sevier. Smith and his party camped
at the confluence of the mountain strem and the Sevier. During a stay of
several days, the group engaged in revelry that culminated in a “stag
dance”. Smith named the locale “Merry Vale” after the
festive mood of his men. In time, the name was changed to Marysvale.
Among Smith’s party was a tough frontiersman, Sylvester Hewitt, who
had been present at the initial discovery of gold in the Sacramento Valley
in 1848. Hewitt was a member of the Mormon Battalion and a competent, daring
prospector. While at “Merry Vale” Hewitt panned Pine Creek
and found traces of gold dust. Word did not spread as rapidly as it might
have elsewhere. Mormon leader Brigham Yound discouraged prospecting and
mining, because he believed his people should first establish themselves
in agriculture and other stable enterprise. Consequently, Smith tried to
prevent the news from being spread by demanding silence from the party.
Historically, the discovery of gold has been a notoriously difficult
secret to keep. In 1868. Lieutenant Jacob Hess and Ebenezer Hanks,
probably having
heard of Hewitt’s discovery, rode into the Marysvale country in search
of gold. They found color in Pine Creek and tried sluicing to extract the
metal from creek gravels, but the concentrations were too small to be profitable.
The men were earning only a dollar a day.
Hess and Hanks were not easily discouraged. They followed Pine Creek
upstream hoping to discover the source of the dust, entering what
would be later
known as Bullion Canyon. On the south side of the canyon, opposite
Beecher Ridge, they found a large quartz outcropping with ore assaying
at $100
per ton. The site became the Webster mine and was the initial stimulus
for Bullion Canyon’s first boom. In 1868 Bullion Canyon and the surrounding
country, comprising about 100 square miles, were organized into the Ohio
Mining District. By 1872, several hundred people were living in the Canyon.
In 1873 Bullion City became the county seat.
Extraction of the gold proved a complex and expensive affair. Ore
produced by the miners had to be smelted before it could be transformed
into
bullion. When the Webster lode was discovered there were probably
no smelters
in Utah Territory. Even if there had been a smelter in Salt Lake
City, it
would have taken a month for a team of oxen, and two weeks for
horses, to transport a wagonload of ore from the mines to Salt Lake
and back.
Transportation was not the only expense, however. Until 1884, mining
a ton of ore in Utah cost about ten dollars, including the wotk
that preveded
the actual extraction. By 1883, there were seventeen smelting
and reduction works in Utah territory. At these smelters, silver ore
was valued at
New York prices. Five percent of the price paid for the ore was
deducted for
loss in smelting. Ten to twelve dollars per ton was charged for
smelting, sixteen to eighteen dollars was charged for refining,
and around
$25 per ton was then charged for shipment of the bullion to New
York.
Expenses like these encouraged claim owners to construct their
own milling and smelting works. Unfortunately, such projects
required considerable capital. Ore reduction mills generally
cost about
a
thousand dollars
per stamp, an amount usually out of reach of a lone prospector
with his
shovel,
pick, and pan.
Consequently, during the first rush, the small-time prospector
in Bullion Canyon often made his profit by selling his claim
to someone
with the
necessary capital to develop the lode. For example, on October
21, 1871, Ash Stewart,
William Stewart, and Luther Rimsey sold their claims in the
Ilinois, Bully Boy, Daniel Webster, Baltic, and Golden Curry
lodes in
Bullion Canyon for
$3,000.
Necessity is the mother of invention, but not always of success.
In 1870, Frank E. King, an influential pioneer in the first
rush of miners,
bought
materials
for a crude smelter. He purchased bricks in Beaver City and hauled
them about 100 miles to Bullion Canyon. As the crow flies,
Beaver City
is only 35 miles
away, but the rugged Tushar range demanded the roundabout route.
King’s smelter was extremely simple. The brick structure, with an area
of 4 feet by 4 feet, was reinforced with large rocks. Fueled by charcoal, the
smelter was slow and inefficient. Nevertheless, the first batch of bullion prompted
a celebration from the miners. Apparently it was at this time that Pine Canyon
was renamed “Bullion Canyon.”
In 1872, eastern capital brought heavy machinery to the Canyon
to reduce the ore. The Piute Mining and Milling Company,
organized in
Chicago,
arranged for
a two-stamp mill with a ten-horsepower “donkey engine” to be erected
in the canyon, probably to service the Webster lode. That the mill was a failure
is certain, but the reasons given vary from mechanical faults to an inability
to adequately reduce the complex ore of the canyon. In any case, with the failure
of the Piute Milla major slump in mining development occurred.
As high grade ore at the “grass roots” level began to diminish, some
prospectors turned to agriculture or raising cattle in the Marysvale valley.
Population in the canyon declined between 1873 and 1878. In 1878, George T. Henry
and Joseph Smith drifted into the Marysvale area from the silver mines at Silver
Reef. While deer hunting just a few miles south of Bullion Canyon, Smith stumbled
onto a rich vein of gold ore exposed on a deer trail. This strike drew away much
of the canyon’s remaining miners, sounding the death knell of the first
era of mining by the banks of Pine Creek.
Mining at this time was rugged, particularly the hard rock
mining of the Ohio Mining District. Miners tried to follow
surface ore
veins into the
mountains by blasting tunnels. To properly set off a
charge, a hole three feet deep
and
about 1 ¼ inches in diameter was drilled into the solid rock for each
stick of dynamite desired. Using a steel two feet in length, and a four-pound
sledge hammer, the miner began drilling. After each hammer blow, he rotated the
steel ¼ turn, preventing a mere notch from being formed. Periodically
the miner stopped to remove the pulverized rock dust that built up in the hole
with an adapted metal spoon. Longer steels were used as the hole became deeper.
It was estimated that one man could drill one foot per hour through the typical
rock of the Gold Mountain Mining District. Two men might work together as a “doublejack” team,
one man holding the steel and the other swinging a long-handled ten-pound sledge
hammer. Such a team usually drilled about two feet per hour, and drilled holes
six feet deep.
Several holes were needed for a “round”, each hole holding a dynamite
stick. The miner cut his fuses in lengths needed to detonate the sticks in an
important sequence. Often, the bottom two charges exploded last, hurling shattered
rock into the tunnel. Appropriately, these last two charges were called “lifters.”
The debris was “mucked out” into ore cars running on iron rails.
Miners or mules pushed or pulled these cars to the surface. Horses were rarely
used, as they tended to hit their heads on the supporting wooden beams of the
tunnel’s ceiling. Before the introduction of carbide lamps some years after
the turn of the century, work was done by candlelight.
Miners lived far from luxury, security, and civilization.
In 1870, the railroad extended to Salt Lake City.
By 1879, the
nearest railhead
was
in Juab, necessitating
a 150-mile trip by wagon for supplies brought to
Marysvale. Such distances resulted in high prices
for imported
goods. Tobacco,
for example cost
$5 for a “large
slab.” This was a huge sum since 40 years later miners in the Gold Mountain
Mining District were earning only $3 a day.
Furthermore, miners were often uneasy at the possibility
of Indian attacks. In April of 1865, conflict
broke out between whites
and a band if Utes
under Chief
Blackhawk in nearby Sanpete County. Over the
next three years more than fifty Mormons were killed,
and many
towns in southern
Utah
territory were abandoned.
Sporadic Ute raids continued until 1873. Also,
in 1873, Paiutes were encouraged to relocate
to the
Ute reservation.
Facing
bleak prospects
on their current
reservation in southern Nevada as well, many
Paiutes simply vanished into the mountains of
southern Utah. LaPreal Nielsen recalls her grandfather,
Frederick Hamel, an early prospector of the Ohio
Mining District, telling
of being run
out of the
area
by Indians, probably sometime between 1869 and
1872. As late as 1879, men around Bullion Canyon
still
wore sidearms,
at
least ostensibly
because
of their fear
of Indians.
Miners lived in log cabins, sometimes sharing
them with another miner and always sharing
them with
rats. Canvas
tents were
also probably
used during
the summer.
Between 1870 and 1880 the population in Piute
County grew from 82 to 1,651 people. Marysvale
precinct
had 297 people
in 1880,
a population
that was
ethnically homogenous.
Out of 1,651 people in 1880, only 122 were
non-white - - 120 of the latter being Indian.
The majority
of early miners
were
born
in the
United States.
In 1870,
54 of the 82 people in Piute county were native-born.
A
further breakdown of the 1880 population reveals
that 1065 residents
of the county
were
native to
Utah territory, with only 312 foreigners present.
Immigrants from Sweden, Norway, and the British
Isles made up
the largest percentage
of the
foreign born, but
gold also attracted men from very different
backgrounds. For example, Frederick Hamel was
among 15 French-Canadians
from
Montreal who
came to Bullion Canyon.
The gorge became a melting pot of cultures.
The personal backgrounds of these men varied,
but all were tough. Ebenezer Hanks is a good
example.
Hanks
was a sergeant
in the
Mormon Battalion,
an Indian fighter,
and a former miner in California in ’49 and ’50, where he reputedly
did quite well. Born in Wisconsin in 1843, James A. Stark came to Bullion Canyon
in 1872 after spending time around South Pass, Wyoming. Thomas Calaway came early
to the area, a Confederate veteran of the Civil War. Lieutenant Jacob Hess was
also a Confederate veteran. After the Deer Trail boom in ’78, many miners
from Silver Reef drifted into the Marysvale area.
The vast majority of these men were not greenhorns.
In their late 20s to mid-30s, they had
already lived on
the edge for
a number
of years.
They
were described
as wandering prospectors, drifting from
mountain range to mountain range looking for an elusive
bonanza. Many
of them
were new
to Utah upon arriving
in Bullion
Canyon. The canyon was a raw environment,
with “whiskey, gambling, and
even worse,” until at least the mid ‘70s.
Gun-toting miners, combined with whiskey
and gambling, created an explosive social
environment.
In the ‘70s, the nearest federal court headquarters was west
of the Tushar mountains in Beaver, which made official justice slow and expensive
to administer. In one instance of assault with a deadly weapon, local law officials
banished the offender to avoid the inconvenience and expense of a trail over
the mountains.
By the 1880s Bullion Canyon was a ghost
of its former self. Isolated and sporadic
development
continued
but not on
the scale of previous
years. The quality of
the known ore deposits simply did not
justify transportation and refining
expenses. As
many lodes became dormant,
most of the single,
wild, and
reckless
men of
the mining camps left for other boom
towns. Some
moved to the Marysvale valley, marrying,
homesteading, and putting down roots.
A few men who had done well in the
first boom became
influential
leaders
of the
county. James
Stark,
for example,
became
the probate judge. By 1872, Jacob Hess
was the county
recorder. The growth of families, probably
more than any other factor,
changed the character
of Marysvale.
Two of the major claims in Bullion
Canyon, the Webster and Bully Boy
(whose boundaries
touch
at one point),
well reflect
the history
of
mines throughout
the canyon.
After the discovery of the Webster
lode, Hess and Hanks joined with
Frank Murray,
Jared Taylor,
and
other area
prospects
to develop the
site. Working
together,
they mined and transported wagonloads
of high-grade ore to Salt Lake City.
Nevertheless,
expenses
crushed their
business
once
ore quality
dropped
slightly.
The shipments attracted the attention
of two rich investors - - a Mr.
Chambers, and George
Hearst,
the father of
Williams Randolph
Hearst.
Chambers and
Hearst owned the fabulously lucrative
Ontario
mine in the Park Mining
District, closer to Salt Lake.
After sufficient inspection, they purchased
the Webster
and Bully
Boy mines. Shipments were attempted,
but soon the mines drifted into
dormancy.
In the ensuing years, Chambers
and Hearst died. The only activity
at
the Webster
in the ‘80s occurred when Tom Fergussen, who held a lease on the property,
cleaned up easily accessible ore bodies in the mine at a tidy profit. Running
the ‘90s, a Mr. Colbath came into possession of the mines. Running an 1800-foot
long tunnel underneath some earlier encountered ore bodies, Colbath revealed
large quantities of very rich ore with a few upraises.
Excitement spread to the East,
where the Bully Boy Mining
Company was
formed to
take advantage
of this
alluring
development. A mill two-and-a-half
miles
west of Marysvale, previously
used for the Copper Belt Mine,
was relocated
to
Webster
Flat in 1912, close to the
mines. Probably built around 1879-80,
the mill had
ten stamps, for
concentrating tables, and a
large
cyaniding unit, giving
the
mine a processing capacity
of 150 tons per day.
Because the cyaniding unit
was completely mismanaged,
the operation
suffered.
The manager, Jacob
Young of Marysvale, quit,
and was replace by another
local. Extremely poor quality
ore was processed at the
mill, reportedly
because
of ineptitude. Because of
managerial ignorance,
men excavated low quality
ore, despite the presence
of richer material nearby.
In 1914, a fire provided
the coup
de grace
of the
operation,
burning the
mill into “blackened, bent and twisted” remains.
At the turn of the century
a new factor dramatically
changed the
region’s
mining equation: the railroad steamed into Marysvale. In 1889, ore still had
to be shipped to Juab siding just south of Nephi, a long, expensive haul. In
1891, the Rio Grande Western Railroad constructed a spur line to Salina, reducing
the distance to Marysvale considerably, but still leaving roughly 50 miles from
the rails to the Canyon. Richfield enticed the railroad with ten acres of land,
and space for a depot and other buildings in town. The town also offered to construct
the grading for the railroad through the city limits. The railroad accepted Richfield’s
offer, and by June 1, 1896, the tracks extended into that town. By October 14,
1896, the tracks went all the way to Belknap, only miles north of Marysvale.
In 1900, trains came to Marysvale.
Bullion Canyon changed
as well. Transportation costs
fell enormously,
and
previously marginal bodies
of ore became profitable.
Even before the rails reached
Marysvale itself, the prospect
of improved
transportation stimulated
further
exploration
and
prospecting.
As a result of this prospecting,
some remarkable claims
were discovered in
the 1890s. In
1892 the Angel mine
and the Apex
#1 claims were
patented. In
1893 the
rich Wedge claim was
patented. In 1899, the Bully Boy
#2 was patented. In the
1890s, George Frank
Dalton uncovered one
of the most exciting
strikes in the
canyon. The Dalton mine
yielded
between
$100,000-$200,000
in gold and silver. George
Dalton was transformed
from an average
prospector
to
a wealthy man
who lived in a luxurious
Salt Lake City home,
bought a
race horse, and lit
his
cigars with twenty dollar
bills. Tunnel after tunnel
was driven
to discover
more gold
in the claim after the
rich vein
ran out, but by 1900
hope had died.
The strikes of the 1890s
did not produce a boom
as large
as the
first one. Indeed,
for
the first
decade
of the
twentieth century
not much
happened in the canyon,
perhaps because the
majority of the holdings were “in the hands of poor
men.” Litigation also seems to have stalled development. In October of
1896, the Wedge became snarled in a boundary conflict with another claim, forcing
the lucrative mine into inactivity. Not until the Bully Boy Mining Co. began
serious work in its claims did the Canyon start to hum again. The fire at the
mill at Webster Flat slowed large-scale activity until once again eastern capital
stepped in.
On November 1, 1921,
the Bully Boy Mines
Corporation was organized
in
the State
of Delaware, and
this corporation
ushered in a boom of roughly
the
same size
as the first rush
at Bullion
Canyon. Work commenced
in March 1922, and
by July ore
bodies were
producing from
$20-$200
per ton.
This second boom
had a fundamentally
different
character than
its predecessor.
Comparison between
the two
gold booms seems
to demonstrate
a thesis
of David Courtwright’s Violent Land, and interpretation of violence on the American
Frontier. The composition of frontier mining society created the high levels
of violence characteristic of so many mining camps of the West, instead of some
mysterious quality peculiar to the American Frontier.
Two hundred unmarried,
armed, young
men with plenty of
whiskey roamed
Bullion Canyon
in the first
boom’s zenith. It is no wonder that the area was called “one
of the wildest and woolliest places on earth.” The same canyon housed a
similar sized population about fifty years later that was very different.
Miners in the
canyon of 1922
had many
more trappings
of
civilization.
Equipment,
housing, transportation,
education,
even recreation
were provided
to
the miners
by the Corporation.
By this
time, hand-drilling
had been abandoned
in favor
of jackhammers,
and the company
furnished Ingersoll-Rand
jackhammers
to its
miners. Electrical
power flowed
from the 125
Kilowatt
2300 volt
A.C. generator
in
the company’s power house. Steam boilers, air compressors, and water wheels
developed by the Company supplied energy for ore extraction.
By June of
1922, almost
200 people
lived in
the Canyon,
including
a number
of families. Besides
the tents
necessary
to house the burgeoning
population,
more permanent
quarters
were built.
A limited
number
of family
homes, with three
rooms each,
were
constructed
in a separate
locale from
the bachelor
quarters.
A bunk
house capable
of housing
around 200
men and
another,
smaller bunk house
with a 40-man
capacity
were built
for single
miners.
In contrast
to the
extreme isolation
of the
1870s, canyon residents
in 1922
were linked
to the
outside world by
telephone.
A 7 ½ mile road connected Marysvale
to Bullion City, and the Company maintained the road in fairly good condition.
Freight going from Marysvale to Bullion City cost four dollars a ton, in the
other direction, two dollars a ton.
The company
provided
a club
house
with pool
tables
and
a reading
room
stocked with newspapers
and
periodicals.
A
dance
hall with a
pavilion
was constructed
in 1922,
as well
as a
baseball diamond
for
the Bully
Boy
baseball
team.
Even the uniforms
were
furnished
by
the
Bully
Boy Corporation.
The miners
earned
standard
industry
wages
for
Utah. In
1911,
the
Sevier-Miller Coalition
of
nearby Gold
Mountain
Mining
District
paid
miners
$3
a day,
mockers
and
millhands $2.75
a
day,
and
mechanics $4 a
day.
One
can
safely
assume
similar
wages
for
residents of Bullion
City.
The
Corporation
charged
individuals
$1.05
per
day for
board.
Mining
activity
in
the
Canyon
declined
significantly
after
1923.
Possibly
ore
bodies
dwindled
to
below
profitable
levels.
Perhaps
extraction
proved
too
expensive.
In
any
case
by
1938
Bullion
Canyon’s major operation was the Iris Mining
Company, worked by about 20 men. Small scale mining also continued on claims
such as the Shamrock and the Cascade. There were still a few occupied cabins
in the canyon, but most workers commuted from Marysvale, about a 20-minute trip
in the ‘30s.
The
more
recent
era
at
Bullion
Canyon
can
be
glimpsed
through
the
recollections
of
men
like
T.
J.
Moore,
who
grew
up
there
as
children.
Moore’s father
mined in the Shamrock and Cascade operations of the late ‘30s. Grinding
work still marked the life of the miner even then, although technology helped
alleviate the burden to some degree. A miner’s day of work focused on getting “a
round in, and a round out.” That is, shattered debris from the last shift’s
blasting was mucked out, necessary timbering was installed, more track for the
ore cars was laid if needed, and a new charge was detonated to finish the shift.
Miners
operated jackhammers
to drill
holes for
the dynamite
sticks. Noise
during drilling
prohibited communication.
Drilling was
a team
effort -
- one
man (the
actual “miner”) did the drilling while his “mucker” held
the drill bit in place by hand. Slow bit rotation made this operation possible.
Bits would be lengthened until the hole was 6 feet deep.
During
detonation, miners
literally “held on to their hats,” as otherwise
the concussion would send them and the attached carbide lights flying. Lingering
gases in the tunnels often produced splitting headaches. Moore remembers many
men placing rattlesnake rattles in their hatbands in an effort to ward off such
headaches.
Bullion
Canyon became
more than
a realm
of work
and sweat.
It became
a realm
of children,
perhaps the
ultimate change
from the
days of
the first
gold rush.
As a
child Moore
straightened nails
on ore
dumps for
his father
underground. There
was no
need for
formal recreational
facilities. Children
had a
sparkling creek
loaded with
plenty of
fish to
catch. There
were berries
to pick,
and or
course always
opportunities to
get into
mischief. Cal
Baker, another
resident of
Marysvale, grew
up in
the nearby
mining town
of Kimberly
in the
30s. He
remembers sledding,
skiing with
homemade skies
made from
barrel staves,
and feasting
on chokecherries
and elderberries.
Moore lived
in Bullion
Canyon only
during the
summers, and
went to
school the
rest of
the year
in Marysvale.
Mining
continued to
decline, with
fewer claims
being worked
during the
1930s and
40s. The
value of
the ore
finally fell
below the
cost of
mining, and
custom milling
facilities were
closed. At
the same
time a
nearby uranium
boom drew
away experienced
miners by
offering higher
wages. The
Great Western,
the Iris,
the Shamrock,
and the
Bully Boy,
the last
claims to
continue mining,
ceased production
in the
early 1950s.
Today
Bullion Canyon
lies within
the boundaries
of Fish
Lake National
Forest. In
1993, the
Passport in
Time Program
of the
US Forest
Service began
field work
in Bullion
Canyon to
develop an
interpretive trail
and exhibits.
Archaeological research
also began
at the
same time
and continues
during the
summer. Currently
the substantial
ruins of
the Bully
Boy Mill,
as well
as many
log cabins
and mining
structures, stand
in the
Canyon. Largely
off the
beaten track,
the visitor
who takes
the time
to travel
up the
dirt road
into the
Canyon still
glimpses vestiges
of the
past.
