Keweenaw Copper

 Thursday, day seven of our UP odyssey, dawned on us with the realization that our trip was winding down.  We would be heading home on Saturday. But speaking of winding down, our seventh day took us to the Keweenaw area of Michigan, the north-western most point of the UP and the northern end of highway 41, which also goes south to Florida.  It was there that we toured the above ground features of the Quincy Mine, a copper mine that produced amazing amounts of copper in the late 19th and early 20th century.  We saved going underground for a later mine tour.  I've mentioned earlier in this blog the tough jobs of loggers and sailors, but, if it comes right down to it, I would probably prefer the fresh air and storms of a ship on Lake Superior in November (with the chance of drowning) to working 12 hour days, by candlelight, a mile underground, with chunks of rock tumbling around you, digging out copper (or iron, depending on the mine) with the very real chance of being crushed to death, or trapped in a collapsed tunnel.

This huge, 30 ft in diameter steel ball, was the centerpiece of a humongous hoist.  The cables winding around it and extending from it lowered and raised men in groups of 33 on a steeply angled wooden 'sled' with a stairstep arrangement of seats (no seat belts of course), and raised heavy loads of copper ore from over a mile down.  The cable tunnel ran 9,000 feet at a steep diagonal, actual depth of the mine about 6,000 feet. to keep it in to perspective, a mile is 5280 feet.  Not at all my idea of a fun place to work.  Top wages were 18 cents an hour, for the most dangerous jobs. 

The smelting facility for the mine (an unrestored ruin now) was located about a mile from the giant hoist, and getting there was an adventure in itself.  No well marked streets with welcoming signs. But once we got there, a very knowledgeable docent led us on an interesting tour.  The above ground jobs there, which had a lot to do with ladling boiling hot liquid copper into molds, were physically no better than the underground jobs, Except, of course, that they were above ground.