Rock Piles

Climbing poor rock piles can be tricky business, but lucky for us this one had been worked over by a bulldozer – creating a easy ramp of rock for us to use right up to the top. It was a small poor rock pile as far as they go, but it was still a good height above the trees and shrubs that surrounded us. When we got to the top, we could easily see the lay of the land and where we were in relation to metropolis.

Cutting through the woods we found ourselves upon a sea of poor rock. This was different then the poor rock we had come across previously. The other rock was brown in color, this being a more common grey color. More noticeable was the sheer size of the pile compared to the others. As we looked up a rising wall of rock reached for the sky all around us. The view was sure to be something – so we climbed.

It is a standard practice for us at Copper Country Explorer to climb any poor rock pile we find, and the Gratiot pile would be no different. However, walking up to the looming man-made mountain gave us some second thoughts. It was much more steep then previous piles, and to make matters worse it was littered with debris. Hundreds of feet of coiled hoist cable wound up and down its sides possibly making climbing it a bit more difficult.

Most of the copper mined on the Keweenaw came from a narrow strip of land only 25 miles in length. At the northern end of this strip you will find the relatively successful Mohawk Mine. This sprawling mine (all six shafts of her) along with the Ahmeek Mine to the south employed over 1600 people at their peak. These people needed places to live, and shop, and eat, and play. Thus the village of Mohawk was

One of the highest concentrations of mines along the Keweenaw can be found in a 4 mile strip of land sitting between the towns of Calumet and Mohawk in an area known as the Allouez Gap. Seven mines – Mohawk, Ahmeek, Kingston, Allouez, North Kearsarge, Wolverine, and South Kearsarge – called this area home sinking over a dozen shafts into the Kearsarge Amygdaloid lode. The lode itself accounted for over 17% of all production in the Copper Country, second only to the great Calumet Conglomerate.

Climbing the pile proved a little difficult, but after some slipping and sliding we made it to the top. The pile stretched out ahead of us in a single long line out into the gap. Beyond it lie a grand vista across the heart of the Keweenaw. Walking along the pile towards the tip, the view opened up all around us. Below us the village of Copper City rose above the tree tops, and further away the sprawling area of Mohawk was laid out over the hillside.

Moving away from the cliff face we walked deeper into the woods until coming across a small road cutting through the woods. We followed it around a corner and came to a large expanse of poor rock spreading out in all directions. We quickly realized that we had walked out from the woods directly on top of it. Various gullies fanned out from the road, some over twenty feet in depth. Once this entire area was a shallow valley, and now had been almost completely filled in with poor rock.

Somewhere along Garden City Road (and presumably near Garden City Pond) should be the ruins of the Garden City Mine. It was our hopes to find these ruins during a drive along the old road early in the fall. Almost too easily we happened across a small poor rock pile along the north side of the road. Poor rock piles mean a nearby mine, and we took a look around to find it. We dropped down from atop the small pile and entered a shaded cedar swamp, sprinkled with a variety of shallow dips and holes in the ground.

The first Allouez Mine – Old Allouez – was begun in 1869. The mine used two shafts to open the newly discovered Allouez Conglomerate Lode sitting at the base of a hill later known as Bumbletown Hill. The mine was the first in a long line of mines to operated in the Allouez Gap, predating most of the other mines by a good 20 years. The mine was worked on and off again through the end of the century but was never very profitable.

After our little discussion the other day on the mysteries of the Seneca Mine and its many names and faces I decided to head on out there to try to clear up at least one of those mysteries – specifically dealing with the existence of the Seneca Mine as marked in the old topo map I featured in that post. (For those that missed it, the map in question is posted above) This map shows two mines – the Gratiot (with 2 shafts) and the Seneca (with 1 shaft). The Gratiot mine is easy enough to find today, its still marked with a sign labeling the area as “Gratiot Location”. However, what is commonly known as the Seneca Mine is to the south and west – next to a small collection of houses that is currently marked as Seneca Location. So, where is this other Seneca Mine, the one marked here on this map?