Mine: Carpenter Mine, Crystal Falls, MI

Began → Carpenter Mine → Became

Operated for 15 years.

From: 1913

Location: N ½-SW Sec. 31 of T43N-R32W;  Also described as NW ¼ of SW ¼ Section 31, of T43N-R32W

Owned by: Hanna Furnace Co. (Hollister Mining Co.)

Produced: Iron Ore, hard and soft, red, high phosphorus.

Method: Underground, worked by slicing and stoping method.

Railroad connection: C&NW and MILW to Escanaba dock.

Until: 1928

Lifetime Production: 2,735,452 tons between 1914-1928.

Photo Info: the shaft house and complex at the Carpenter Mine in Crystal Falls. [MINARC]

Notes

The Carpenter Mine was located southwest of Crystal Falls in Iron County south of the Tobin Mine. [LSIO-1950]

Time Line

1912. The biggest boost that the Crystal Falls district has received in many a day was the decision by the M.A. Hanna people to open up the Carpenter property. This lies between the Dunn and Tobin mines, on the NW ¼ of SW ¼ Section 31, of T43N-R32W.

The Carpenter will be equipped with a complete plant of new machinery commensurate with the size of the property. The boilers have already been ordered and will be on the ground as soon as the railroad is built into the mine. Both the St. Paul and the Northwestern have surveys made for the connecting tracks. The St. Paul track is authorized and work will commence upon it in a short time. It branches off the St. Paul track which connects the Tobin Mine with the Dunn about where the track crosses the west line of the section.

The Northwestern survey continues the Dunn mine branch from the Dunn mine to th Carpenter property, which means that the ore will go out by way of Mastodon instead of through the local yards and thus relieve the congestion that frequently exists here owning to the large amount of ore handled. [DD-1912-0810]

1913. March. The electric line from the Carpenter mine to the Ravenna has been completed and the installation of electric machinery at the latter property will be carried on right along so that when the plant at the Carpenter is ready to produce power the Ravenna will be in shape to take it. [DD-1913-0329]

1913. Forest fires started up with vengeance during the week, the hot and dry weather having fixed the slashing so that they were excellent food for the flames. A big fire started in the Blomgren chopping south of the Carpenter mine driven by a strong south-west wind, it rapidly advanced until it threatened the Carpenter mine. Fire Warden Wilson was appealed to and he went to the scene of action and assisted in fighting the flames. Along towards evening reports from the section between the Dunn and Mastodon became quite alarming. The big Sawyer-Goodman chopping's where the accumulated slash material of the past four years lies, was known to be on fire. A gang of men at work all night fighting back the fire which gained steadily. The course of the fire was from south-west sweeping directly towards the Dunn mine and the adjacent Carpenter property. 

The fire started at the site of the new Mastodon mine where A.D. McRae had a gang of men at work clearing the space where the proposed stripping operations are to be carried on. At the new Mastodon townsite the fire burned up all the stakes which surveyors had prepared and swept over the entire ground to be platted. [DD-1913-0305]

1913. Vilna MacDonald, daughter of former Lt. Governor MacDonald who was killed in the Watersmeet wreck years ago, has won a decision in the federal court sustaining an old quit claim deed that she held for about fifteen years before putting it on the record. The property in question is the tract of lands known to old settlers as the "Maitland lands", one of the descriptions containing the Carpenter mine.

Miss McDonald's action was taken against Dr. Carpenter who several years ago purchased an interest in these lands after a long and hard job in straightening out the title and getting them in shape to give options upon. The federal judge held her title good and should his decision stand, no purchaser in Michigan is safe against old quit claim deeds not shut off by warranty deeds of subsequent dates. The case will be carried to the supreme court of the United States. The interest Miss McDonald gets is about 3-56 (sic) in the mineral interest to the tract of lands mentioned which embraces some 8,000 acres. [DD-1913-0920]

1914. The Carpenter mine shares a steam shovel with the Ravenna mine. It is moved between mines. [DD-1914-0815] The Ravenna also received electrical power from the power plant at the Carpenter.

1915. The first train load of iron ore for the season was shipped yesterday from the Carpenter Mine at Crystal Falls. The 30-car train was received at the St. Paul docks in Escanaba. [EDP-1915-0418]

1915. The case of Frederic Carpenter vs. Flora B. Holt, residuary legate of the late Miss Vilna I. McDonald of Escanaba has been settled. (See 1913 entry above). The suit involved three-fifty-sixths (3-56) interest in the mining estate of 1,357 acres of land in Crystal Falls and Mastodon townships and include the fee of the Carpenter Mine, operated by the Hollister Mining Company and the Neely property, under lease to the Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Co. Mr. Carpenter's title to the disputed land was confirmed in the settlement. [DD-1915-0605]

1915. At the Carpenter mine, a new system of tracks will have to be installed by the railroads due to the caving of some of the ground over which the present tracks run. The track which serves the mine is a joint one constructed by the St. Paul three years ago at considerable expense. It branches off the Dunn mine branch just below the old Columbia pit. [DD-1915-1106]

1915. A crew of Milwaukee surveyors came to town last Tuesday and put the finishing touch on a lot of work that is contemplated at the Carpenter and Dunn mines. The present track to the Carpenter crosses the ore body and will soon be caved. Engineers were at work last fall selecting a route by which the Carpenter may be reached without crossing any more ore bodies.

It is understood that the plan contemplates the abandonment of the present Tobin mine branch of the St. Paul because of the threatened caving of the ground over which the track runs at the Bristol mine. It is probably that the work will be a joint nature as the present tendency of the railroad companies is to limit the outlay for mine sidings by joint ownership thus obviating the duplication made in the past. [DD-1915-1211]

1916. January. Attorney Davis, Sr. and the Milwaukee railroad company came to terms on a price for right-of-way across the Davis farm near the Carpenter mine and the construction of the track will commence at once. [DD-1916-0129]

1916. The joint service track which is being built to the property of the Carpenter Mine by the Milwaukee and North-Western railroads is coming along fast now that the Winston Bros. have got under way. They have their machine equipment upon the job and are moving dirt at a rate that assures the completion of the work by May 1st when the new track will be used entirely and the old one abandoned because of the caving of the ground at that point. [DD-1916-0416]

1916. The new switching arrangement entered into last year between the Milwaukee and the North-Western roads is in effect in the Crystal Falls District. By virtue of this arrangement the MILW switches all of the cars for the Tobin, Dunn and Carpenter mines and the C&NW all cars for the Balkan and Judson mines (near Alpha). 

The C&NW empties for the Tobin, Dunn and Carpenter are pulled to the Odgers junction where they are left in the yard and a Milwaukee engine picks them up and distributes them to the respective mines. When they are loaded, the MILW engine hauls them back to the place where they were secured and there they are left for the C&NW engine.

By this arrangement the roads escape the duplication of switch tracks and the danger of having crews of different roads operating over the same tracks. The ore business is very heavy in the Carpenter district and the indiscriminate running back and forth of different road crews would certainly result in many collisions.

The MILW is maintaining seven engines here to handle the business and the C&NW has fully as many. The arrangement on the MILW is somewhat different than on the C&NW. On the latter road, there is a yard master and switch men, but with the MILW all employees are in the train service, the crews shooting right out for Channing as soon as their trains are made up.

1917. An alarm was turned in from the Carpenter mine last Friday night and the (Crystal Falls) fire truck was dispatched. The rule is that permission must be had of either the mayor or the fire chief to take the truck out of the city and it was necessary to run the truck down the street to pick up Chief Davison and some firemen before starting for the mine.

After making the turn below Tuft's store the truck started up the street picking up firemen until it arrived at the courthouse corner when she was headed for the two mile run which she made in a remarkably short time. The fire started in the blacksmith shop and spread to the adjoining carpenter shop. The next was the machine shop and across a small passageway was the dry. 

When the firemen arrived they found the shops all ablaze. The mine hose was playing a stream from the mains upon the building but there was no force to it. Connections were made and the fire pump worked with  magnificent pressure, the men got the fire under control although it took them an hour or so to get all the fire out. The value of the property is more than the cost of the truck, another evidence of the wisdom of the city in making the purchase it had made. [DD-1917-0717]

1917. Iron County mines have an order for 3,000 car loads of iron ore and Marquette range mines 2,000 car loads, all of this ore to go all-rail via the car ferry to Frankfort and Detroit. The mines from which the ore is to be shipped are the Carpenter at Crystal Falls from which 1,500 cars are wanted, the Bates at Iron River, from which a like number is wanted, and the American mine at Diorite from which 2,000 cars are wanted.

This ore is to go to Detroit via the C&NW, AARR and the DT&I. It is for use in the furnaces at Detroit which have not and cannot get adequate boat service to handle the ore that is needed to keep the plants going. Orders have been placed with the railroads for cars but so far not a single car is in sight.. The ore must be shipped in the big steel gondola cars used in handling coal. [DD-1917-0818]

1920. Reports from Marquette county last week that Mr. Ford intends to operate the Imperial Mine west of Michigamme. This property is on the Michigan Iron & Land Company's purchase and is a low grade limonite ore that the CCI people were unable to handle at a profit and for that reason they released the mine from the lease that they held upon it. Mr. Ford's furnaces are now and have been running on Crystal Falls ore from the start. The Carpenter mine furnished considerable ore to Ford and it is understood that most of his supply has been coming from the M. A. Hanna properties, the Hanna people owning the Detroit furnace which is located near the Ford plant and whose docks were utilized while the dredging was being done for the Ford slips. [DD-1920-1030]