Misc data and adventures of a Tayopa treasure hunter

Gidday this is all for those who had not worked in the gold mining industry. The following clip is a basic process of mining from a underground mining operation not an open cut. But it gives the basics although some of the process varies a little between mines depending on size.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UdTXIFLw-4








Here is another clip of the 4 key mine stages of a modern mine development. It brings back a few memories for me. As some of jobs I actually work as in my early working life. Exploration drilling. Drilling blast holes. And smelting gold.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ERb87Zphhc







Anyway they both give an insight into mining but are not gold placer mining. Placer mining is like the TV shows like Yukon Gold etc....

or like this mine on the Palmer river.

gold mine.JPG

A lot of work.....

Crow
 

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Crow, I worked as the Assayer for the Colorados mine in Sinaloa,/ Durago, At the top of the Sierras, then later they combined the job as trouble shooter and Assayer.Eventually leading to mill foreman / assayer . But we were in no way comparable to the giants you presented. I had to make my own cupels by scrounging all of the dead cows.for thier bonesc calcining the bones for the cupels. hen there wern't enough dead cows I had to mix the bones wth cement.m then making the cupels It was fun in general, except when the Indians held us ( Bert and I) hostage for three days .Interesting story there, want it? It was fun working at the mine.Not too big an operation. We only had 4 mills. I was allowed complete judgement.I always ate with the men to show them that we were well aware of any food problems, I sure raided the chille jars. Bert was the only woman up there, I think that she loved it, she worked as a form of secretary, the men loved her. We had a rotation of monthly for the men.one week down It took 14 hrs to go to Culican.It was beautiful up there, Pines and oak, not what most think as Mexico.I did enjoying working there. You might say that I am knowlagable of small mines. in remote areas.Politics lrad to the deactivation of the mine and I wert back to my exploring.
 

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fWell I reported in to mine, to find my quarters Berts' and mine were 'up on the hill" with the boss - I always fugured he was counting on gourmet meals free of chargeWell
Later I checked on the assayers building, it was down in the ravine, below the mine. there I found a locked room. I quickly foun the key, and entered to find a Perkin/Elmer adsorbion meter instrument, about 4 or 5 ft across, very dusty and showing disuse. When I had free time i disassembed it, cleaned it, and eventaully recalibrated it, there were several bottles of calibrating liquid. He immediately developed a love?hate relation with me.The company had been putting him off on the guarentee M touching it had immediately voided the guarantee. The Cahn electronic balance was the next, I had to comepletelly rebuild and recalibrate it. After that I could do no wrong and turned over every poroble to me.
T
 

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Real of Tayopa said:
fWell I reported in to mine, to find my quarters Berts' and mine were 'up on the hill" with the boss - I always fugured he was counting on gourmet meals free of chargeWell
Later I checked on the assayers building, it was down in the ravine, below the mine. there I found a locked room. I quickly foun the key, and entered to find a Perkin/Elmer adsorbion meter instrument, about 4 or 5 ft across, very dusty and showing disuse. When I had free time i disassembed it, cleaned it, and eventaully recalibrated it, there were several bottles of calibrating liquid. He immediately developed a love?hate relation with me.The company had been putting him off on the guarentee M touching it had immediately voided the guarantee. The Cahn electronic balance was the next, I had to comepletelly rebuild and recalibrate it. After that I could do no wrong and turned over every poroble to me.
T
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Gidday Don Amigo

Ah... the Joys of working in the mining industry. A symphony of characters with conflicting ambitions trying to do a job without strangling each other....

I remember a host of people some times ya loved other times you hated them. So so many gone from the passage of time I wonder how many are left? I miss them all just to catch up once more but old man time has taken so many I am afraid.

Its there stories of everyday people in their time and places is the real treasure amigo......

Crow
 

Real of Tayopa said:
hi, may I bore you with the time Bert and I were held hostage for 3 days by the indians. ??
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Gidday Don Amigo

You by no means bore me! I agree with Oroblanco please to continue.:icon_thumright:

Old Crow.jpg

i await in my chair with interest. Fly my pretty's......

Crow
 

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Ok gentlemen. First you have to imagine the geographical location. It is a fairly deep , arroyo, looking upward. At the top left hand side is our home, on a gentle slope. From there about 5 - 600 meters down is the mill site, an excavated area where enough ground was scraped out to enable the ball mills lo be in a straight line
with the three cyanide tanks running paralel to the mills, but at a lower level. lThen perhaps 700 meters to the bottm of the arroyo , on the right side is a cut into the side of the arroyo for the assay lab. Further down the arroyo on a fairly level spot is the dinning hall and the kitchen. . Then further down was the Almcen,Bert's desk for her work further down, still on the right side ,is the scrapped out place for the origional entrance to the vein structure. inside are the remains of 12 workers that were trapped by a cave in and died before they reached them, so they just stopped Both sides of the arroyo are covered with dense Pine and Oak beautiful. Almost forgot, the pond was on the same side as the mills When it rained the little arroyo were of many colors, depending upon the ore, there were reds, whites, greens, and combinations of them. It very pretty site,
 

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I was holding my weekly "talky-talk" where the men could present thier complaints, sugggestion. The men loved it, they were actually being heard, instead of just being brushed off. when a man burst in and breathlessly told me to get down t o Berties office.I saw her surrounded by a group of angry men, one of whom was pressing a 380 to the head of the labor foeman. I was just in time to see her extend a forfinger and brush the pistol away from his head while saying " that's not very nice" This was so unexpeced that the men ,including the pistelero, went quiet i realized that I had not just married a beautiful woman, but one of couage, I never felt so proud of her I took
dadvantage of the quiet to ask the men why ? they answeed me by saying he lied and cheated one of us out of money that he needed to feed his family with. I answered that he would get justibe, if true, as soon as the supreme jefe (boss ) returnred
from Culican. They nad contracted a killer Indian, part of his commision was to be one of the 14 year old daughters f the forman he would be there in three days. .They also said that as much as they liked both me and my Bertie, we would be killed if we tried to escape by the road,They , They didn't appreciste the fact that I had just Installed a two way radio a few days earlier , I called Culiacan and ecplained the situation to them. They appologied by saying that the mine wasn' dn their State and couldn't. do anyting. I then asked them to send up some guns, yhey said only a certain General in Mexico city ould do that, but it would take a week o so -- no guns. Contact with the Durango authorities was the same, they were washing their hands of us ,Our jefe arrived by air the second dsy , he said that he would't want to miss this for anything. He was a former Hitler youth and felt that somehow he had missed his opportunity. He agreed that I had done the right thing, but insisted in useing two full sticks for a graphic demonstration, they went off simultaneously, peppering the witnesses with rocks. Then the killer Indian arrived, t saw much arm waving,
, then he mounted his mule and rode off, disgusted. I guess that I had saved one of the daughteres " a fate worse than death", The next day the foreman and I were drinking coffee in the patio
whn a high powered bullet passed between us. He apparently didn't know what it was , I did, having heard them in my Guadalcanl experience. I suggested that e finish our coffee inside, mean while waving to the unknown shooter to let him know that I recognized his effort, he could easily have hit one of es if he had wanted to, there were no further incidents and camp life resumed to normal . The gunman even appologised to my wife, which she accepted. Other than that it was never again mentioned.
 

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Gidday Don Jose your Bertie was one tough lady in her time.

I could imagine was was quite capable of letting them know she was in charge. You was a wonderfully lucky man amigo.

Crow
 

I agreeb Crow, she was something, I spent two years in an old fashioned, turn of the century rules before the local priest agreed to marry us. , he wanted five. She told me later that she was determined to marry me when she first saw me. Her mother always referred to me as "Berties soldado" because of my military walk. It was a case of robbing the cradle, I was 32 and she was only 18 when we were finally married My entire family loved her, my cousin wanted to divorce his wife and marry her { not serious I never found anybody in the US that didn't love her at firt sight despite being of Mexican peonage.I was very privileged to have her for some 70 years, as you will be for your lovely wife, only the other way around.She spoke excellent English with a vocabulary far greater than the av,. American.


View attachment 1837815this was when she was thirty.
 

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I have danced with the old ones ) I was drinking very warm beer with Recardo. a geologist, when I told him that. He straighened up and became very serious...We were in San Felipe, BC. in 50's The mood changed very quickly. He leaned forward and commenced questioning me. San Felipe was a very primitive fishing village accesible by a very rough dirt road." yes I have danced with them.". I replied. I climbed the mt chain with a 60 lb pack, mostly water. When I arrived at the canyon I found a stream of clear water coming from the canyon, sigh. I was waiting for the old ones to appeasr. They finally did, then commenced dancing in the flickering fire light. They leaped, twiriled, stomped and shufled. This went on all night, but they did not return the next night, they had retrested into the shadows . the next day I gathered all the ollas, and utensils I could findthen buried them where the gov't nthropoligists could find them, then settled down to explore. They never returned to dance amid the shadows of my campfire sigh, Life, but It was good enough for me. To this day the little canyon, and the Old ones, remains unexplored, they can sleep in peace, except to dance, in my imagination .I'm just an old romantic sniff.
 

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Gidday Don amigo When the time comes and your life flashes before you, you will have that dance my friend to eternal sleep. Until then dance in the stories of the living and live every breathing moment. Relish the moment that you have survived the long hard treadmill of humanity.

I have no doubt many here in their passage of their own lives have met many people come and gone with many passed on into memories.....

Such is the journey we all take.....

Crow
 

crow, thank you.Some day I will tell you of my adventures with the cannibals in the Solomens. " "the long mary kai kai, but they fade in compariison with yours in New Guinea and else where.
 

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Don Jose,

You say you have danced. What an understatement ! Each line on your life's 'dance card' has been filled with adventure and memories. I think it's fair to say that most of us have sat out a few dances (opportunities) in our lives, but I can't say that of you.

There is a song, "I hope you dance', which reminds me of you. Part of the lyrics include this:


"I hope you never lose your sense of wonder
You get your fill to eat but always keep that hunger
May you never take one single breath for granted
God forbid love ever leave you empty handed
I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean
Whenever one door closes I hope one more opens
Promise me that you'll give faith a fighting chance
And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance
I hope you dance."

And to that, Don Jose, you can stand and say "I have danced."
Please continue the stories of your experience; they're fascinating.
Don....
 

el gusto es mio Senor Don Jose :notworthy: :coffee2: :coffee2: :coffee2:
Nice lyrics Don, and so true. :icon_thumleft:
 

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