Showing Ore Body and Shaft Method of Mining
The Indians seem to have had no previous knowledge of these ore deposits.
The first shipments of ore naturally were samples taken from what afterward came to be known as the Jackson mine and trials of them in blacksmiths’ forges were made at Jackson, Michigan (from which town went the first seriously-minded pioneer, Philo M. Everett), and at Cucush Prairie. They were soon afterward tried in a blast furnace at Sharon, Pa.
The first plan was to build forges and manufacture iron near the mines. So there was established on Carp River a forge to which the ore was hauled in winter when the ground was frozen. It turned out, however, that while very good bar iron was manufactured here, it could not be delivered in Pittsburg at a cost less than $200 a ton. As the market rate for iron then was but $80 a ton the plan was not financially successful.
Lighting the Fuses in a Shaft Mine
Attention was turned to the shipping of ore to furnaces better located as regards coke supply and market. It was possible to make this a profitable undertaking only through cheap ore handling and transportation. So, to-day, the ore which is better adapted than the other raw materials for handling by labor-saving devices and transporting without deterioration, is taken to the coke and limestone, and to the market for the product. While the weight of coke used is but half that of the ore smelted, its greater bulk, loss by breakage when handled in quantities, and deterioration upon exposure preclude its manipulation in the way which would be necessary to get it to the ore.
View of Hull-Rust Mine, near Hibbing, Minn.
The marvelous development of this territory into the greatest ore producer of the world, including the hauling of the first small shipment on mule back, the building of the plank and then the “strap” railroad with grades so steep that the small trucks often ran over and killed the mules, the building of the steam railroad, the successive building and enlarging of canal locks at Sault Sainte Marie connecting for use of ever larger and larger ore boats the waters of Lake Superior and Lake Michigan, and the growth of ore boat fleets to such size that during the shipping season scarcely ever is one boat out of sight of another over the entire 800 mile journey from Duluth to the furnaces along Lake Michigan and Lake Erie, is within the memory of men still living. Marquette was the shipping point during the earlier days and the history of this and adjacent regions during the latter half of last century vies in pioneering flavor with the tales of our early western frontiers, and with the more recent Yukon mining camps.