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The following article is
excerpted from the article “Story of
Chief Consolidated Operations in Tintic”,
in the August 8, 1916 issue of the
Eureka Reporter
Iron Ore, one of the
mining publications of the great copper
district of Michigan, in its issue of
August 2nd, 1918, has a most
interesting front page story of the
Tintic mining operations of Walter
Fitch, whose keen foresight and splendid
business ability gave our district its
largest mining enterprise.
How the Chief Was Born
The idea of the
enterprise was started by a trip made
over the mountain to Eureka, Utah by J.
R. Finley and Walter Fitch in 1906, this
following the time when Mr. Fitch had
given up his mining affairs in the
Michigan iron and copper districts to
take a look through the great west.
They had made an inspection of the
Mammoth and Grand Central mines laying
in the southern part of the district,
and concluded to walk back following the
lime beds on their strike to the north.
These lime beds Finlay recognized as of
the same character as those enclosing
the ore in those mines. These beds were
followed over to the north slope of the
mountain until on that side they were
lost to view by the covering of rhyolite.
The eruptive at this point presents its
thin edge, gradually growing thicker
until in the gorge where Eureka City is,
it is estimated it has a thickness of
approximately six or seven hundred
feet. The Chief shaft occupies a
position about midway between the large
mountain and the town and there this
rhyolite is about three hundred feet
thick. The complete covering of lime
stone measures in that section accounts
for the failure of the prospectors and
miners of the ore possibilities there
and led to its being dubbed Poverty
Flat.
There Was Small Shaft
That Was Abandoned
The shaft referred to was
at the time Mr. Fitch and Finlay made
their trip of inquiry about eight
hundred feet deep and was owned by a
company known as the Little Chief. This
company had been operating twelve years
and had the distinction of having levied
43 assessments and of finding no ore.
Mr. Fitch and Finlay wanted to go into
the mine and were told this was against
the rules.
Mr. Fitch finally decided
that the opportunity was just as good as
he had expressed himself concerning it,
and he went in and carried out the plan,
finding the ore zone, and ore in it of
commercial grade and quantity.
The Good Results
The Chief Consolidated
Company was then organized, and on
February 16, 1909 took over all the
property of the Little Chief. Since
that time the company has mined 352,000
tons of ore which has yielded mineral as
follows:
Gold 45,000
Ounces
Silver
8,250,000 Pounds
Lead
53,800,000
Copper
362,000
Zinc
2,200,000
In addition to the
foregoing, several tons of manganese has
been produced. For the sale of these
products the company received
$5,600,000, and has expended for opening
the mine equipping it, making better
than nineteen miles of workings: mining
the ore, enlarging and sinking the shaft
to the eighteen hundred level, enlarging
the stations, putting in a pumping
system, together with pump stations and
reservoirs, and all the electric
appliance connected with the pumps, also
for exploring for ore in the different
parts of the district, and the
unsuccessful trying out of one mine
outside of the district – the total of
these cost about $3,000,000. There have
been expended in acquiring new mineral
lands about $1,000,000. The additions
give the company an ownership of about
5,000 acres as against about 50 acres
with which it started business. There
has been paid out in dividends
$1,124,342.12 and there are still on
hand $300,000 in cash and $420,000 in
liberty bonds.
Changed Views of Many
Mining Men
The developments of Chief
Consolidated have brought about a great
change with respect to this particular
mining camp or district whose early
glories failed so fast because
developments were not properly
directed. Now that new ore zones have
been found at greater depth and at
considerable distances from former
openings mining men have been attracted
but find the best located claims are now
all in the ownership of the Chief
through the enterprise and
far-sightedness of its management.
Are Wise Financially
The directors believe in
the protection of infant industries,
that good old Republican doctrine that
has always worked out so well for those
who practiced it. They therefore
propose to maintain a liberal treasury,
and have regularly set aside from the
earnings of the company a liberal
allowance each year, and this reserve
has now reached a figure not far from
the amount of its capital liability.
This they deem necessary to insure
proper protection to the enterprise,
possibly to insure or to help maintain
regularity of the dividend
disbursements, to meet the contingencies
resulting from the irregularity of its
ore depositions, and the contained
values, to meet the increasing exactions
of war, and to prepare for the extending
working capital demands of an expanding
business.
Securing These Fine
Results
A considerable part of
these quite satisfactory results are
said by those who are familiar with to
be largely attributable to the
concentrated efforts of the Fitch
family, which was not only contented to
leave Salt Lake City and live in Eureka,
but has confined itself, with slight
exception, exclusively to this
particular enterprise. In doing this it
has commandeered all outside necessary
technical skill to help the work along
and this included expert mechanical,
electrical, metallurgical, geological
and accounting men. The geology of the
district has been intensively studied
and plotted all the time, and for the
last four years has had Mr. G W Crane, a
special geologist, devoting his
undivided attention to that special
department.
To the sons of Mr. Fitch
credit is given for having had direct
charge of the work and of building up
the fine organization now possessed.
They opened the mine and established it
as it is today. Cecil Fitch has always
been the superintendent, taking that
place on his graduation from the
Michigan College of Mines at Houghton,
Michigan. His brother Walter graduated
a little later and worked as his
assistant for six and a half years, and
then went into the business of doing
mine development work, having a couple
of hundred expert shaft and drill men,
and is conducting operations in three
states.
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