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Betty Lee Mine
Today is dawning bright and beautiful, and the temperature is predicted to be in the mid 80's. Friends have been telling us about the historic Betty Lee Mine 12 miles into the Goldwater Gunnery Range.
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| Nice roads- sandy, but nice |
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| Signs warn controlled access by permit only |
Joan and I pack a picnic lunch and load up on water. We can drive most of the way with our Tracker, but the last 1/2 mile is hiking up a bolder strewn canyon. The heat is tempered by a cooling breeze from the north.
As we exit the pavement and enter the Barry M. Goldwater Range, we call in to range access at the Marine Corps Air Station in Yuma for permission to enter. We both have valid permits and in a few minutes we are good to go..
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| Joan checks out the old stone foundations at the road terminus |
My able navigation, and Joan's expert off highway driving gets us to the trail head in no time. The "parking area" here is surrounded by stack stone walls, some with plank and sod roofs- worker housing and dynamite storage we are told.
We decide to sit in the shade of a Palo Verde tree and have our lunch before heading up the gorge to the mine.
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| Joan heads out on the trail to the Betty Lee Mine |
The trail starts out easily enough following the dry arroyo deeper into the canyon...
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| Higher up the canyon, the arroyo is filled with giant boulders |
As we continued up the trail the canyon walls started to close in and the trail becomes more challenging.
Okay, in truth I got a little off the main trail. I found a better track up on the cliff wall to the right, and it is just a bit easier.
Notice the steel pipe in the stream bed. It looks like the miners ran a plumbing line from the mine to the cabins below. That's a lot of pipe!
Back in the day, the boulders in this canyon had to have made this a real challenge for getting supplies in and ore out. These miners were a tough lot. According to the Arizona Dept. of Mines , this claim, was owned by Glen Copple and Gust Svensson. They managed to find a pay grade ore seam that runs across the canyon and deep into the ground. The mine is, and always has been, on government owned property, but in 1910 when the discovery was made it was not a gunnery range.
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| Flat space is at a premium in this steep canyon. This could be more housing or working space? |
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| Storage space for mine timbering- or buildings that were dismantled or have collapsed? We don't know |
When we re-gained the trail on the canyon wall we walked into a wide area where there was either a wood yard or an older wood frame building. My vote is a former building, but it was very hard to tell. Masonry and rock are the only building materials that can withstand the withering Arizona sun.
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| A cast iron wheel lets you know you're getting close to the mine |
We knew we were getting close to the actual mine, when we came across this giant flywheel in the trail.
I cannot imagine hauling this cast iron wheel up the trail we have just negotiated. A short way ahead is another just like it. The cast iron spokes have been broken out of the wheels, but I've seen many of these on the old impulse engines that powered mines of this era.
The path we are walking on gets ravaged by floods that regularly scour these canyons. The trail most likely looked much different than it was back when the mine was in operation. I would guess that, boulders have tumbled down from above and rushing water has re-arranged everything.
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| A large tailing pile lets you know you've arrived at the mine. |
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| A narrow cut leads up to the mine entrance |
Around the next corner in the trail we are greeted by an enormous tailing pile, wood timbers and steel rails. I can't wait to explore! Note the stone wall in the picture above and to the right of the tailing pile. I later found out that was created for the powered hoist that lifted the workers and the ore out of the mine below.
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| Narrow gauge rails lead into the mine |
A set of iron rails still runs from the opening of the mine out to the the tailing pile we had just climbed up. Records show the mine was in operation from 1927 to 1937. During that period they really did work. Diagrams of the mine I found on-line show that this seemingly tiny mine is in fact 700 feet deep with about 6 working levels! The narrow cut you see above (right side) is the width of the quartz seam that the miners were working. Removing the quartz left smooth walls on either side, and where clearance was adequate, the approximately 3-4 foot width became the tunnel width. (observed, and also in the mine reports on-line)
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| Here is a look at some crysocolla , the mineral deposit that brought miners to the Betty Lee |
As you can no doubt imagine, mining is hard work. Assays vary but the ore here was roughly 2% copper, with 0.3oz gold per ton and 1.4 oz of silver per ton. Records show that in all, about 500 tons of material was shipped. Pretty amazing.
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| Gasoline powered hoist winch still stands by the vertical shaft |
The desert is a fabulous place for storing machinery. The levers and drum on this winch still operate! The impulse engine has been partially disassembled, but otherwise The winch with a new cable, and flywheels would still be useful.
Across the arroyo from the main shaft was another tunnel (adit).
This adit is about 8 feet tall, and the full width of the quartz seam or about 4 feet wide. I learned later that this adit is almost 200 feet long, but its main feature for me, is just inside the opening.
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| 120 foot shaft occupies half of the tunnel floor just inside the opening |
Just inside the entrance, is a vertical shaft taking up half of the floor. I dropped a small rock down the shaft and counted to five before I heard it hit something. Later I found out shaft that goes down 120 feet! I have almost no mining experience, but I figured this must be an air shaft for the levels below.
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| Part of a mine diagram showing the upper 5 levels of the Betty Lee Mine |
Here is a portion of a diagram I found at Arizona Department of Mines, showing the underground portions of the Betty Lee.
In 1942 when the Department of Defense "withdrew" these lands to put together the Goldwater Gunnery Range. At that time there was no recorded activity at this mine, so the government hired an assessor to determine if the mine was economically viable. The outcome was "yes" which meant that the Department of Defense (DoD) had to pay a fee to the owners for baring them access to the mine from 1942 to 1978, when a new assay found that the mine would no longer meet that test. The claim was revoked.
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| These impossibly steep canyon walls surround the Betty Lee mine in the desert south of Tacna, AZ |
Joan and I thoroughly enjoyed our afternoon of adventure! Time to head back home and relax on the patio in the shade.
Your Traveling Friends,
Jeff and Joan
