Quincy Mines and Copper Harbor

We don't usually do a lot of tours but when I was looking at things to do in and around Houghton the Quincy Mines kept coming up.

Houghton is in the Keweenaw Peninsula, sitting on the Keweenaw Waterway and the largest city in the Copper Country region. Across the waterway sits Hancock and in Hancock is the Quincy Mine. It is an extremely well preserved copper mine site. There are two main parts: the surface works, and a small part of the underground mine that you can visit.

I really had my fingers crossed on this one. It was a two plus hours tour, I had booked morning tickets and with kids.. especially teenagers you want to make sure things will not be too boring.

This will be long and wordy - be warned!

The first part of the tour started above ground. Copper was first discovered over 9000 years ago when the Native Americans discovered it in the area making the area one of the oldest mining sites in the world. Copper was called 'red metal' and most people believed it to be a myth.

Douglas Houghton, the first geologist was sent up (once Michigan became a state) and confirms the presence of copper, leading to a mining boom and many many failed ventures. 

Quincy Mine was able to find copper but struggled to turn a profit, that is until they found the perfect angle.. 54 degrees. That turned out to be the sweet spot and Quincy Mine was able to reach record breaking depths of 9000 feet making it, at the time, the deepest shaft in the world.

Quincy Mines remained highly profitable for 100 years.   

Uptil 1860 the mines hoist system was based entirely on human power. But in 1916 the Quincy Mines decided to switch to steam. But to create a steam powered hoist they need 1000 tons of steel to make it but World War I hit and the steel goes toward the war. They have to wait three years before they can make their hoist. Pictured above. 

So while they wait they beautify the facilities.. to entice investors. When the hoist is finally made and delivered they realize they never thought about how they would get the hoist into the facility.. it took them a good year just to disassemble and reassemble it inside!

Enough about the hoist.. let's talk about people and the commute. 

It started with ladders, then moving platforms and finally the man car.

When there were ladders the miners would spend one hour commuting beneath the surface to their work stations and another hour returning to the surface. They were not paid for the additional two hours they spent at work.

Above is a photo of the men in the man car and below the man car in person.

The man car shortened the commute by 30 minutes each way. 

These man cars and their operators were very important.. a slight distraction to the man car operator or a single part of the car broken or damaged and it could ruin the company. 

In 1929 the stock market crashed signaling the great depression forcing every mine in the region to close, including Quincy. They reopened again in 1937 but by 1945 the mines closed permanently and the underground shafts were left to flood. 

At this point in our tour we boarded a cog train to take us 350 feet underground. The cog train had no historical significance and was built specifically for the tours.

 

We entered the mine via a horizontal entrance on the 7th level. There were 85 fully flooded levels beneath us.

 

This above was the real size of the shafts.. they were blown larger for the tours. Imagine a grown man trying to fit through one of those and spend hours stooped like that while working. The mines are also 43 degrees year around. 

The mine sits within a flood basalt formed by massive volcano eruptions that caused layers of lava to cool on top of each other. Over time the weight of these immense rock layers buckled inward creating Lake Superior. This buckling activity forced pure minerals into the rock pockets creating the famous Keweenaw agates, the greenstone of Isle Royale and the worlds purist copper deposits. 

Pure copper is a soft, malleable metal. Standard saws nor TNT could break it into transportable pieces. Only a hammer and chisel could do the job. Sometimes it would cost more to break down the copper then it was worth. The largest chunk of pure copper ever found in the mine was the size of a Greyhound bus. 

There is still so much copper abandoned within the walls of the mines. 

The most skilled miners where the Cornish miners and they worked on strict monthly contracts earning $40-$50 a month.

Those who pushed the copper laden carts were paid the least and they usually broke their backs within a year. Can you imagine the desperation forcing you to take such a job?

A week in the life of a miner.

Tuesday - Friday - Teams of 2 to 3 men manually drilled holes into the rock face. They worked only by candlelight usually attached to their hats using clay.

Saturday - the holes were packed with black powder and detonated.

Sunday - the mines were left empty so the dust could settle

Mondays - miners returned to excavate and clear the blasted rock. 

Then came the Widowmaker drill. One machine that could do a weeks worth of work in a single day. The mines were able to fire 50% of their work force and increase productivity by 50%. But when the miners drilled they kicked up a cloud of fine silica dust that settled into their lungs resulting in what was then called consumption.

The men feared this drill not just for the disease they would eventually get but because it meant they were working alone and if there was an accident or a wall came down there would be no one there to hear their calls for help. 

  

You see those little candle lights up in the distance.. the men were expected to crawl up rock faces and drill in such locations. 

Eventually 10,000 miners walked and went on strike in 1913 demanding 8 hour work days and being able to work in teams of two. It lasted 9 months and unfortunately the corporations pockets were deeper. The broken and starving miners had no choice but to return to work. Some migrated to Detroit to find jobs in the automobile industry. Many Finnish immigrants decided to go back to farming like they did back home. 

The mines had a 30% casualty rate but they of course only counted those who died or were permanently disabled inside the depths of the mine. If you still had a pulse by the time you reached the surface it was no longer considered a mine death. 

Those who died within the mines, their families were given a tiny pennance along with 30 day eviction notices.

When you think of the glory days of mining, how 80% of that copper was used to build this nation's electrical grid and supply the military with critical ammunitions during war time. Don't forget the immigrants who helped build this country, the immigrants who gave their lives, whose families were then thrown into the streets as a thank you. 

This is a must do tour.. seeing it in person.. I left the tour with a heavy heart but so much appreciation for the miners.

Next we drove an hour to Copper Harbor. Copper Harbor is a remote, scenic village located at the absolute northern tip of Michigan's Keweenaw Peninsula along the shore of Lake Superior.

We had a great lunch at Lake Effect. We picked up some thimbleberry donuts at Jamsen's.

Then we headed to Hunters Point Park and walked the 1.7 mile loop trail. There we spotted thimbleberry bushes.

Later we walked around.. it was a pretty little town.. lots of shops to pop into. We grabbed some coffee, the boys ice cream and then we headed to our last activity of the day, Estivant Pines Wilderness. 

I have no pictures. I would give it a 0 stars if I could. It was a 1 mile loop and I don't really know what it was that we were supposed to be seeing? It was a path among trees but they didn't look like special trees.. just trees, I thought maybe there was a group of special pines we would see at some point.. a large one.. nothing.. we just walked away with so many bug bites.. even with the generous amount of bug spray we used and very disappointed. We grumbled our way to the car and headed back to Houghton. 

We enjoyed the pool, relaxed a bit before heading out for dinner. This time we choose The Ambassador. Very good.. great pizza.. 

Next stop Porcupine Mountains.

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