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Information on Ymir Gold and Silver mines.
In 1893, Ymir was called Quartz Creek. The southern part
of Ymir was built first, along what was known as Quartz Creek. In 1893, the Fort
Shepherd and Nelson Railroad came through Ymir. They opened up a town site that
year that was the nucleus of the Ymir of today. The railroad named the town of
Ymir after a god of that name that is a part of Norse mythology.
One of the buildings of the old town of Quartz Creek was
moved to Ymir. This building is now owned by Mr. Hoplind, and was moved by Pete
Peters, who was known as “ Pete the Packer”. Across the front of the building
was painted “Pete the Packer's.” There was a bar on the lower floor of the
building and rooms overhead.
There was also a brewery in Ymir that supplied the eight
saloons that flourished in Ymir. The owner's name was Chris; he was of German
descent. Around the year 1900, a woman drowned herself in the town's water tank.
The water tank was replaced after this happened. The present schoolhouse is on
the original site. The old school was burned in 1936 and replaced by the present
building. Up until 1925 Ymir had one of the best hospitals in the Kootenays. It
burned down in 1933. There was an aura of mystery on the fire's origin. Many
thought it was burned down purposely.
The steam trains used to come through with the freight and
passenger service and there was a water tank on the mouth of Quartz Creek, right
in front of the present day Ramble Inn. In the wintertime when it was cold and
there would be heavy snows, the trains would be late getting in at night. When
they did make it in, they would whistle for the operator to come to the station.
They not only woke him up but also the whole town! Ymir had a large,
nice-looking depot and warehouse.
The first mining claim in the Ymir district was located in
1893 on Porcupine Creek. The old mines are still there today. They were known as
the Porcupine and the Porcupine. The time the Ymir Gold Mine was opened was
after this, in 1897. When the eighty stamp mill was built at the Ymir mine, it
was the largest stamp mill in the British Empire, so one can see that Ymir was
known across the country.
The first Provincial Policeman in Ymir was named Captain
Forester.
There was a big fire in 1903, right in front of the town
where the Yankee Girl Mines tramline comes down. The Ymir Mine closed down in
1907.
During the years of 1932 to 1942 there were operating
mines around Ymir, numbering thirteen. Some had large crews, like the Yankee
Girl. The out break of World War II caused most to close . Supplies couldn't be
acquired for operating gold mines.
There was a very bad fire in 1922 near Porcupine valley.
Some men and lots of horses and other animals died in this fire.
The classiest hotel in Ymir was the Cosmopolitan. This was
among eight hotels operating at the time. Mr. J. Dunn then owned the grocery
store now operated by Mrs. H. Burgess. There was some trouble at the
Cosmopolitan Hotel. The owner shot a man during it's operating time over an
argument that was done in self-defense. The grocery store was owned by Mr. J.
Dunn and his partner from 1935 to 1958. There were two churches in town. One
caved in with the snow one year and he other still stands today. It is the Roman
Catholic Church. Many of the descendents of that time still live in the
Kootenays today.
The first fire through here was in 1903. Burgess's store
used to be a bank and was located at what is now Nord's Garage. Ymir had a
newspaper called the Ymir Herald in 1906. Ed Emilson still has a copy.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MINING IN YMIR
by George Murray
Ymir miner and local historian
About 1885, the placer gold mining on the Pend d'Oreille
River was coming to a close. The placer miners in this area started to look for
other st-reams that might produce the precious metal. They started moving north
up the Salmon River to try their luck in the river and its tributaries. A few of
them settled at the mouth of a small stream at what is now the present location
of Ymir. They constructed three or four log cabins and named both the creek and
settlement by the same name, Quartz Creek. These intrepid miners eked out a
living by extracting gold from the creeks in the area; no doubt, they also did
some trapping in the winters.
In the early 1890's, the Hall brothers from Colville,
Washington, came into this area to search for lode mines. They discovered
outcroppings of what eventually became the Ymir Mine, but due to the lack of
roads or any other means of travel in the area, they continued towards the
Nelson area and they located the Silver King Mine, which developed into a rich
silver, gold, copper operation.
The Hall Mines Smelter in Nelson and Hall Creek, six miles
north of Ymir, was named after these two Indian prospectors.
In the summer of 1895, Jerome Pitre, Joseph Pitre and
Oliver Blair staked claims that were to become the famous Ymir Gold Mine. This
was followed by the staking of many more claims in the Ymir area.
All this staking activity did not go unnoticed by D. C.
Corbin, the American railroad magnate, and he commenced to prepare for
construction of a railroad from Northport, Wash. to Nelson. This railroad became
known as the Nelson - Fort Sheppard line. This line proceeded along the Columbia
River from present day Waneta through Fruitvale to Erie, Salmon Siding, renamed
Salmo and on to Quartz Creek. D.C. Corbin constructed the station a short
distance north of Quartz Creek and renamed it Ymir, after the Earth God of Norse
mythology.
With the completion of this railroad, Ymir really
blossomed forth as a major mining community. The Ymir Mine was the largest and
the best producer. It started with a forty stamp mill and later added another
forty stamps, making it the largest stamp mill in the British Empire. There were
many other mines that started during the ensuing boom, Porto Rico, Dundee,
Wilcox, Blackcock, Howard, Hunter “V”, Yankee Girl, Goodenough, Tamarac and many
others. Some of the better known prospectors were Jerome and Joseph Pitre, Alex
Gayette, S. Bywater, E. Peters, and in the later years, Tom Wilkinson, Joe Dunn,
Ed Emilson, Oscar Anderson, Ed Haukadahl, John Rankin, Alex McDonald, H. Jackson
and many others.
All. the above mining and prospecting activities led to
the establishing of the booming town of Ymir. By 1899, Ymir had eleven hotels, a
bank, post office, one church, P. Burns & Co., butchers, a newspaper, school
grades I to 10, police station, three jails, blacksmith shop, mine recording
office, physician and surgeon, plumber, barber, mining engineer and assayer,
undertaker, two hardware stores, justice of the peace, notary public, mining
broker and others. The Ymir Water Works, beaded by
J. W. Ross, was formed and constructed in 1897. It
serviced the whole town and was the envy of all the smaller mining towns of that
period. The population at this time, was 800. But the area surrounding and
serviced by the town contained another 400, at the least.
All the mining in the Ymir camp was done for the gold
content, while silver and lead were also recovered; they played a minor part in
the overall net returns.
The Ymir Mine was, by far, the most important one in the
area. It started out with forty stamps and added forty more, making it the
largest. The other mills in.the area, had a total of sixty stamps, making a
total of 140 stamps in the vicinity of Ymir. Each stamp could crush and
pulverize 2Y~ to 5 tons of ore per hour. This came to aproxximately 4000 tons of
ore per day. There was also many smaller mines shipping crude ore directly to
the smelters at Trail and Nelson. This flourished until the early 1900's; most
of them ran out of ore reserves.
It should be noted that the area had sawmills at the mouth
of Porto Rico creek, Ymir and at the mouth of Porcupine Creek; these sawmills
provided most of the lumber for the construction of the town of Ymir and all the
buildings and houses, etc. at the various mines. All this meant that there was a
lot of men employed in logging and sawmills in and near Ymir.
An interesting footnote: The Ymir Mine alone used one cord
of firewood per hour, each and every day of the year, just to keep their steam
boilers working.
Most of the mines ore bodies were depleted by about 1905,
and due to the low price of gold ($20.00 per ounce) and poor demand for other
metals and minerals, Ymir fell on hard times. It did pick up somewhat just prior
to the war of 1914 - 18, as the demand for minerals increased because of the
need for them in the war effort. It can be said that Ymir's fortunes were at a
low ebb from 1919 until 1955.
At this time, the United States and England set, by mutual
agreement, the price of gold at $33.00 per ounce. This caused a second
boom in Ymir, and by 1936, there were four more mills operating in the district,
Goodenough, Yankee Girl, Wesko and the Durango. Plus, a lot of exploration by
other mining companies, quite a number of leasors, shipping ore to the Trail
smelter. This writer arrived in Ymir in July of 195? and can attest to the fact
that it was a very busy town.
In September of 1959, Canada declared war on Germany, this
had a bad effect on Ymir's fortunes, for several reasons: a lot of the younger
miners joined the Armed Forces and this along with the fact that more miners
were needed in the other mines that were producing strategic war minerals, also
the ore reserves were being depleted and the operating costs were starting to
escalate. All this caused the closure of the existing mines.
At the end of hostilities in 1945, Ymir's population had
decreased to it's lowest since 1896, with only about 125 living here.
During this period, a lot of exploration work was carried
out in the Ymir—Salmo area, this resulted in three large lead, zinc mines and
also one tungsten mine. Most of the mining of this era was a considerable
distance from Ymir, but due to the upgrading of the roads, and the availability
of the automobiles, which had been in short supply during and after the war,
this made it easier to commute back and forth from the mines. Ymir's population
gradually increased to about 550 in Ymir and the surrounding area.
While mining is at it's lowest point in the past 90 years,
there's a considerable amount of mining exploration in this general area,
hopefully this activity will produce some more operating mines.
In closing, I would like to state that mining is not
necessarily finished in this area. There is no doubt that there is still
minerals and metals to be found in this area, including: gold, silver, lead,
zinc, and tungsten. Ymir, the Norse Earth God, will see to it that Ymir, as a
mining town, will not be forgotten.
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