Gold was first discovered on this island in 1881. Sorely against his will, John Treadwell was forced to take some of the original claims, having loaned a small amount upon them, which the borrower was unable to repay.
Having become possessed of these claims, a gambler's "hunch" impelled him to buy an adjoining claim from "French Pete" for four hundred dollars. On this claim is now located the famed "Glory Hole."
This is so deep that to one looking down into it the men working at the bottom and along the sides appear scarcely larger than flies. Steep stairways lead, winding, to the bottom of this huge quartz bowl; but visitors to the dizzy regions below are not encouraged, on account of frequent blasting and danger of accidents.
It is claimed that Treadwell is the largest quartz mine in the world, and that it employs the largest number of stamps—nine hundred. The ore is low grade, not yielding an average of more than two dollars to the ton; but it is so easily mined and so economically handled that the mines rank with the Calumet and Hecla, of Michigan; the Comstock Lode mines, of Nevada; the Homestake, of South Dakota; and the Portland, of Colorado.
The Treadwell is the pride of Alaska. Its poetic situation, romantic history, and admirable methods should make it the pride of America.
Its management has always been just and liberal. It has had fewer labor troubles than any other mine in America.
There are two towns on the island—Treadwell and Douglas. The latter is the commercial and residential portion of the community—for the towns meet and mingle together.
The entire population, exclusive of natives, is three thousand people—a population that is constantly increasing, as is the demand for laborers, at prices ranging from two dollars and sixty cents per day up to five dollars for skilled labor.
The island is so brilliantly lighted by electricity that to one approaching on a dark night it presents the appearance of a city six times its size.
The nine hundred stamps drop ceaselessly, day and night, with only two holidays in a year—Christmas and the Fourth of July. The noise is ferocious. In the stamp-mill one could not distinguish the boom of a cannon, if it were fired within a distance of twenty feet, from the deep and continuous thunder of the machinery.