From Territory to State
The growth of lode mining brought a number of changes to the region, including the arrival of a new breed of workers and investors. A knowledge of geology and mineralogy was necessary to locate ore deposits and veins. Lode mining, unlike placer mining, required large numbers of workers, including skilled miners and unskilled laborers, skilled engineers, and massive amounts of capital. It often took months or years before a mine showed a profit, if it did at all. Once the ore was mined, it had to be refined, another long and expensive process. Most of the early ore mined in Arizona was sent east to be smelted, some of it as far as Swansea, England. Since transportation was a major expense for all mines, only the richest ore was shipped.

As the number of American miners and mine investors grew, their desire to separate the area from the territory of New Mexico soon surfaced and quickly became a vigorous movement. Initially, their plan was to divide New Mexico territory horizontally at about the 34th parallel, creating a long, narrow territory reaching from Texas to California.

Between 1856 and 1862, fifteen measures were introduced to develop the Arizona territory, but Congress refused to take action. In 1860 citizens drew up boundaries, created four counties, elected a governor and sent a representative to Washington, but Congress still refused to recognize the governor. Sylvestor Mowry went to Washington D.C. and had a pamphlet printed, Memoir on the Proposed Territory of Arizona. Although it was the first publication exclusively on Arizona, the pamphlet brought no action. Sylvestor Mowry even fought a duel, having challenged an editor who was critical of his efforts.

Much of the delay in creating the Territory of Arizona was the nation's involvement in the Civil War. With the war being fought in the eastern part of the country, military posts in Arizona were abandoned. Unfortunately, just a month prior to the outbreak of war, a confrontation between Lt. George N. Bascom and Chiracahua leader Cochise resulted in open warfare by the Chiracahua. The withdrawal of the army in April 1861 left the mines and ranches of Arizona defenseless. Apaches swept through the country killing, destroying and burning at will.

Supporters for territorial status persisted and eventually their work, along with the efforts of their investors, paid off. On February 24, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the measure creating the Territory of Arizona. During the same period a U.S. military unit from California drove Confederate forces from Arizona. Their commander, displaying a strong interest in mining, recommended placing the capital of the territory near the mining camps in the Bradshaw Mountains. His recommendation was followed, making Prescott the capital of Arizona. The capital would be moved several times before landing, in 1889, in Phoenix, where it remains today.

A major cost in lode mining was the expense of hauling equipment and materials in and ore out. Large ore wagons and 20 mule teams were a major expense. Mining demand for rail transportation resulted in dramatic expansion of both narrow and standard guage railroads.

Photo Courtesy Bisbee Mining & Historical Museum

Arizona's Silver Boom
With peace restored and the army to protect them, prospectors again combed the mountains of Arizona for mineral deposits, this time seeking silver. Silver prices were high, there was plenty of rich ore and it was near the surface. As a result silver mining boomed. Much of the early development was in the Bradshaw Mountains where numerous camps sprang up. Prospecting soon spread to other parts of the territory. In 1883 a soldier in a military road building unit in the Pinal Mountains discovered ore that eventually led to the Silver King Mine.

The real boom town of silver camps evolved from discoveries made by Ed Schlieffelin, prospecting in the southeastern part of the territory. Although army patrols from Fort Huachuca warned that prospecting in Apache land all he would find would be his tombstone, Schlieffelin persisted. When he struck it rich, in a bit of bravado, he named the camp Tombstone. Within a few months, hundreds of miners flooded into the camp. By 1881 Tombstone had a population of 4,000, making it Arizona's largest town and the biggest community between New Orleans and San Francisco.

Tombstone's history is typical of many of Arizona's rugged and isolated lode mining camps where getting ore to smelters or markets created a major transportation expense. Water, both the lack of and too much, was also often a problem. For example, at the 520 foot level, lode miners hit water, greatly increasing ore removal costs.

As Arizona's mining companies became larger and more impersonal, silver miners formed societies and unions to provide work and social benefits. In 1884 Tombstone's miners formed a union affiliated with the Knights of Labor and demanded a pay increase.

In 1886 fire swept the camp destroying the pump house. The 1893 repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act was the final straw. The mines began to shut down, and Tombstone, despite its boast of being "The Town Too Tough To Die," began to wither away.

From Historical Atlas of Arizona. Second edition, by Henry E. Walker and Don Bufkin.

Copyright © 1986 by the University of Oklahoma Press.

By 1893 it had produced $22,860 and would eventually produce another $13 million, but its boom was over.

The Copper Crusade
Fortunately for miners the decline in demand for silver was matched with an increasing demand for copper. Although some prospecting, identification of sites, and even limited mining was done earlier, copper mining did not become important until the 1890s. In most cases the copper camps of the 1890s were camps that had earlier mined other minerals, usually silver.

One of the earliest of the important copper camps in 1865, was initially located by Henry Clifton in extreme eastern Arizona in the San Francisco river area. When the placers he was working there played out, he apparently went to Silver City, New Mexico.

A group of men from Silver City staked claims in Arizona in 1872, establishing the camp of Clifton — The Arizona Central claim. The group included the Metcalf brothers, Jim and Bob. They were able to persuade others, including the Lezinsky brothers, to grubstake their operation. The camp that developed was named Morenci after a town in Michigan.

Continuing the Michigan connection, The Detroit Copper Company was organized in Clifton/Morenci. Because of the terrain, the Lezinsky brothers developed a narrow gauge railroad and a long incline from the Longfellow mine down to the smelter. Originally mule drawn, it later used a small, narrow gauge engine, which was the first in Arizona. Between sixty and eighty tons of rich ore were smelted daily and carried by wagon to La Junta, Colorado. The brothers sold out to a Scottish syndicate, the Arizona Copper Company, in 1882. About the same time, William Church persuaded the Phelps-Dodge Mercantile Company to invest $50,000 in his operation. When he finally retired in 1895, Church sold his interest to Phelps Dodge.

Ben Regan established the first claim at Globe in 1874. The name of the camp comes from the story, probably apocryphal, of the discovery of a large silver nugget on which an image of the earth was etched. In 1881 Regan sold his claim to the Globe Mining Company.

Also in 1881 the Old Dominion Mining Company (OD) was formed. One year later, the two firms merged, and Phelps Dodge (PD) entered the camp, buying some mines in the area. The Lewishon Brothers of New York bought the OD in 1895. The expense of freighting ore by 20 mule team wagons was eliminated when they built a railroad to the Southern Pacific at Bowie.

With good transportation available, the camp grew rapidly. When the OD ran into water however, the Lewishons were ready to sell. PD bought their interest in 1903. Other mines came into the area afterwards, but the OD and PD controlled the camp.

In 1876 claims were established in Central Arizona at the deposits first identified by the Spanish almost 300 years earlier. In 1880 Dr. James Douglas visited the camp and persuaded his New York clients to purchase the claims. When they sold an option to Eugene Jerome, he insisted the camp be named for him. These claims were incorporated as the United Verde Copper Company (UV) in 1882. The UV had rich ore but high transportation costs. Ore had to be freighted to Ash Fork, making it difficult to make a profit. In 1888 Senator William Clark of Butte, Montana bought the United Verde. Transportation costs were reduced by building a narrow gauge railroad to Jerome Junction to connect with the Santa Fe, Prescott, and Phoenix railroads, which provided rail transportation north to the main line at Ash Fork.

Besides the usual mining camp difficulties with water and fire, Jerome had an unusual problem. It was built on a fault. This made following the vein difficult and later, as a result of extensive tunneling and blasting, would cause the camp to slide downhill. To the east of the fault, the Little Daisy Mine, incorporated as the United Verde Extension (UVX) after years of exploration, hit 45 percent copper ore. Developed by James Douglas and PD, the UVX produced $125 million in ore. In 1935 after the death of Clark, PD bought the UV. By its closure in 1953, Jerome had produced over $600 million in gold, silver, and copper.