John Denver keeps floating thru my mind as I take in all that surrounds us. Today the puffy white clouds are drifting thru navy blue skies, throwing shadows across jagged multi-colored rock, jutting straight up thru the greens of pine and yellows of aspen, how can there not be a God.
Driving North thru Creede, Colorado brings us to the Bachelor loop road. The road was of small red and black shale, and was close to being 4-wheel drive only so we go up it very carefully. I would say the grade is about 12 percent, if you aren’t careful the tires will start to spin, not a good thing. We encountered several Silver mines, an abundance of panoramic beauty and a herd of Mule Deer, and then continued on to the Creede Cemetery. Sadly it has fallen into a state of disrepair; weeds, fallen head stones and dry-rot; a sad legacy to those interred in this drab, colorless piece of history.
“Holy Moses” was what came out of the mouth of Nicholas Creede when he accidentally stumbled (literally) upon a piece of silver; the name stuck and the town was named after him (because he was rich as heck). The silver mines here were the largest producers in the United States and still have twice as much silver left as was taken out; they know exactly where it is and how to get it. I suppose they are waiting for the price of silver to be enough to make mining it worthwhile.
Wherever you find silver you will not find gold; gold is found by quartz deposits and silver by amethyst. Now that you know, get out there! Don’t forget your mule.
The Volunteer Fire Department is partially housed in a large cave; I will refrain from any caveman jokes. Next to that is an opening that goes back into the mountain about 500 yards in a semicircle and comes back out further along the mountain. We went on a tour with a miner who had worked the local mines from 1964 until the mines were closed in the eighties. Brutal would be what I would call the conditions the old miners encountered; hours on end pounding on a chisel to open holes long enough to put in a stick of dynamite. Later they had pneumatic drills which were responsible for the deaths of many miners until they started using water to stop the dust that claimed so many lives. The holes were drilled in a circle, and loaded with dynamite. Then they would light the fuse and run like hell. After the rocks were blasted loose, they would be loaded into ore carts and pushed to a location to be removed from the mine for crushing and chemical treatment to remove other materials from the silver.
After a full day of chiseling, blasting and moving rock, the miner would then leave the mine and go get himself blasted. The only guys that got rich were the mine owner, and the purveyor of mood altering refreshments (booze).
One interesting practice in the mine was used when the vein they were mining was real wide and deep, this was to start at the top, remove a layer of about 8 feet from one side to the other of the vein. Then fill the void with cement and sand. This provided a solid roof under which they could safely remove the rest of the vein.
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