During the third quarter of the 19th century, copper mining had begun its southward migration to greener pastures around Calumet. One of the pioneers of this movement was the Osceola Consolidated Mining Company. While its original workings on the Calumet Conglomerate were less then successful, its holdings along the nearby Osceola Amygdaloid were a different story. (Explore Osceola Mine >) This success prompted the company to expand further, manifesting itself in 1897 with the opening of two mines along the Kearsarge lode – the North and South Kearsarge Mines.

Climbing down from our lofty perches atop the poor rock piles, we found ourselves walking along the grounds of one of these original mines – the North Kearsarge. We had stumbled upon an old road that once ran from Kearsarge to Copper City. A century before our footsteps would have been joined by countless others, walking the same road on the way to our job a mile underground. We decided to follow it as well.

After some distance, we could make out another pile of poor rock looming ahead of us through the trees. In front of it was a clearing, in which the road we walked made a hard left turn down into the valley. Turning the corner ourselves we came face to face with our first ruin – one we instantly recognized. It was a hoist building, and we had seen it before.

Except for scale, what we were looking at was a carbon copy of the hoist ruins found at Osceola. All the details were there including the surrounding poor rock wall, the H-shaped foundation built from brick, even the iron rods sticking up from it at various points. The hoist that once resided here had obviously shared the same fate as its Osceola brethren, missing since being cut from its mounting bolts and removed. The influence of this mine’s owner was apparent. Both hoists (Osceola and Kearsarge) were built using the same plans. A one size fits all approach to copper mining that as we have seen at Kingston and Centennial, continued till the empire’s demise. ( view panoramic >)

Usually at this point in our explorations we turn to look for the rock house, but our attention was diverted by another structure that sat on the other side of the hoist ruin – a large poured concrete structure that looked a little out of place. Specially since we didn’t find it at Osceola. This was one we didn’t know.