The Atlantic Mining Company is the oldest of the southern range mines, having began its life as the ill-fated South Pewabic Mine in the 1860′s. The South Pewabic – as the name implies – was a mine in search of the rich Pewabic lode, which had been so successful for the Quincy to the north. Unfortunately that copper-rich lode was never found south of the Portage, and instead the South Pewabic found itself mining an extremely soft and copper-poor extension of the Ashbed Lode. The Ashbed’s copper was suspended within a deposition of almost sand-like material, making it extremely difficult to mine and process. The South Pewabic quickly folded, but in 1872 the Atlantic thought it could do better. Surprisingly it did, and would end being one of the more successful mines of its era.

The Atlantic Mine consists of a half dozen shafts, labeled “A” through “F” from the north to the south. The shafts were connected by a long elevated tramway, which would process the copper bearing rock at a centralized rock house. The mine operated its own short line railroad, which brought rock from the mine several miles north to its mill at Portage Lake. That mill would be forced to close, however, thanks to government concern over its tailings and the neighboring canal. The Atlantic would build itself a new modern mill a half dozen miles to the west along the shore of Lake Superior, connecting it with the mine with an extension of its railroad now known as the Atlantic and Lake Superior.

While the mine was able to work its portion of the Ashbed Lode profitably for many years, the sand like consistency of the lode made the mine itself incredibly unstable. Because of this the mine suffered from numerous mine collapses during its lifetime, resulting in several shutdowns for many days while the damaged areas were repaired. In 1911 the mine would be rocked again by another collapse, one large enough to measure over 3.0 on the Richter scale and shake houses as far away as Calumet. This time the collapse caused far too much damage to repair, and the mine was forced to close its doors for good.

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