to see. There
are the tailings, the sl
ag, and with some imagination, there's the old Silver City smelter. The Silver City Smelter Was Big Operation Reduction Works South of Town Once Employed More Than 200 Men and Women Sit of 1913 Silent Movie By RICHARD PETERSON Daily Press Writer
Ore was hand-picked from steam powered conveyer belts by men - and children. The equipment was "the best known to metallurgical science." While families depended on the operation for a livelihood. And in 1913, a silent movie was filmed at the site by a prominent California movie company which later merged with Warner Brothers. It was the Silver City Reduction Works, the pride of Silver City and which fro a brief time was a boon to the economy, making mining in the Grant County possible in those early years. Some 60 years later, there is nothing left of the operation. The Silver City Reduction Works went by several names before it was finally scaped. It was originally build by the Hearst family to handle gold and silver ores hauled from their Pinos Altos mines. This were difficult years for the operation, and a final crunch came in 1902. The plans was handling just about every ore it could get - custom smelting included. And that meant cop
per was among those ores. Copper, in fact, was such a vital part of the smelter's daily operations that depressed copper market conditions forced a closure of the smelter. That was in April. On June 30, 30, 1903, the plant caught fire and was leveled. Silver City's hopes were dashed since the whole operation was going to be sold and once again put into productions. The sale took place anyway, and Comanche Mining Smelting Co. was the new owner. The reduction works were build on a larger scale. In 1906, the newspaper had this to say: "The big red building in which this ponderous machinery is housed is 72 feet high and is by far the most imposing structure in theses parts, being 63 feet in width and 122 feet long. "A metallic conveyer will carry the ore from the bins to the large crusher, from whence it will be elevated... the oversize of this going to the picking belt were boys and men will be employed to pick out the different classes of ore that is to go direct to the smelter. "The water for the mill will be pum
ped from the arroyo, which passes through Silver City and past the smelter... The little Silver City, Pinos Altos & Mogollon railroad hauled ore to this smelter, but only briefly. Comanche was absorbed by Savannah Copper Company which operated the plant for a short time. Even at first, Savannah was caught up in the dream that first captured the Hearst family, and later the Comanche Co. S
avannah made some improvement at the plan, and the smelter could allegedly handle between 250 and 300 tons or ore per day. Like Comanche, Savannah was also interested in buying ores f
