GENERAL41483

• Permit No: M1995097
• IBM Index Class Name: General Documents
• Doc Name: BIBLIOGRAPHY WITH INTRODUCTION GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND LIST OF MINERALS
• Media Type: D
• Archive: No

INTRODUCTION
railroads raced toward the growing city - the Colorado Midland and
the Denver & Rio Grande. The narrow-gauge Rio Grande won the race
reaching Aspen in November 1887. The D6RG anticipated its own
future by laying three-foot rails on standard-gauge ties. The
standard-gauge Midland arrived in February 1888. The Midland was
delayed by late delivery of steel for the Maroon Creek bridge which
remains in use today on Highway 82, the primary road into Aspen.
Thus by early spring 1888 the railroads had arrived, most of the
litigation had been concluded or settled, and Aspen stood at the
threshold of its boom years - silver was selling for slightly under
a dollar an ounce.
The mining boom that started with the completion of the
railroads transformed Aspen from a silver town with a promising
future to a bustling, sophisticated industrial city. By 1893 ten
passenger trains and five freight trains arrived and departed daily
on two standard-gauge railroads. Old photographs and maps attest
to the industrial development of Aspen. Spurs of both railroads
circled the city, directly serving the mines lower on the slopes of
Aspen and Smuggler mountain, including the Mollie Gibson, Smuggler,
Durant, Millionaire, and Independent. Tramways brought ore down
the steep slopes of Aspen mountain from the mines located higher on
the mountain, including the Aspen and Compromise and the mines of
Tourtelotte Park. The Holden Lixiviation Works had been
constructed on the west side of Castle Creek across from the Texas
(wheeler) smelter. Physical concentrators, including hand-sorting
facilities as well as mechanical equipment, were in use at the
larger mines, including the Mollie Gibson and Smuggler, and five
samplers were busy analyzing the various ores before shipment to
the smelters of Leadville, Denver, Pueblo and beyond.'
The city boasted a street car system, electric power, a
city-wide water system, and a telephone company. Business blocks
were under construction or planned by the most successful
businessmen of the community (a couple of whom were absentee
owners). The wheeler Opera House was the third largest in the
state. The Hotel Jerome was by far the most luxurious hotel on
Colorado's western slope. The city's population had skyrocketed.
A permanent population of 12,500 with up to 5,000 transients made
it the third-largest city in Colorado behind only Denver and
Leadville.
All of these processes - mining, concentrating, smelting -
as well as the needs of the city and its populus required a
' The distinction between mills, concentrators and smelters is
important. Mills were size-reduction facilities and were frequently
combined with concentrators where hand or mechanical methods were used
to separate valuable minerals or metal from gangue or country rock.
Smelters were chemical processing plants. See further discussion, post.
Bruce A. COl11RS - XVl - SMUGGLER BIBLIOGRAPHY