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CA - New Almaden,Santa Clara County - April 28, 1879 - Quicksilver Mining Company, Stock Transfer Ce

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Western Americana Start Price:50.00 USD Estimated At:100.00 - 200.00 USD
CA - New Almaden,Santa Clara County - April 28, 1879 - Quicksilver Mining Company, Stock Transfer Ce
Session D is a Mail-Bid Only Auction. Absentee bids will be accepted only. No live bidding will be allowed. All winners will be contacted after the auction. BIDDING ENDS MONDAY JUNE 27 AT 5PM PACIFIC TIME!!!
Lot of 2 transfer certificates, #s 5115 and 5117, both transferred on the same date. One is transferred to Robins & Robinson, 5 shares, and signed by D. Gilligan, Atty., representing Hewson Kilbreth & Co. The second is transferred to L.A. Miller, 100 shares, and is signed by LA. Miller, Atty. representing VanDeventer & Palton company. No vignettes, gold colored print on white paper. 5" x 10 ½.” New Almaden is situated in the Capitancillo Hills of the Santa Cruz Mountain Range, 12 miles south of San Jose.’ In 1846 the New Almaden mines began mining cinnabar, a bright red mineral that contains mercury and sulfur, in order to harvest the mercury, or quicksilver as it is also known. This was California’s first mining operation. Interestingly, these mines produced more fortune than any of California’s gold mines. Quicksilver can separate gold or silver from crushed ore, and was necessary in one method of extraction. Thus, the production of the mines of New Almaden had a direct and critical effect upon the success of California’s Gold Rush. In 1863 the Quicksilver Mining Company assumed ownership of the New Almaden mines from the Barron, Forbes Company. That company in turn had assumed ownership of the original mining claim in 1846, which Andres Castillero had obtained from the Mexican government a year earlier. The town of New Almaden soon grew to 1800 residents and over 700 buildings, mostly houses for the miners who flooded in from all parts of the world. The town contained a “Spanishtown”(inhabited mostly by Mexicans) and “Englishtown” (inhabited predominantly by Cornish miners), and there were also Californios, Chilenos, and even some Chinese miners working there as well. Following is a brief summary of the mining operations: The mining occurred in what is known as the Cinnabar Hills. In order to extract the cinnabar ore, the workers dug "Main Tunnel" into Mine Hill in 1850. The Main Tunnel was 10 feet high. Workers tunneled over 100 miles into the Cinnabar Hills. The deepest point was 2,300 feet below the summit of Mine Hill. The Randol Shaft sunk into Mine Hill in 1870, in the subsequent 20 years miners removed 300 tons of ore per day. Workers divided the ore into three piles by size. The ore was roasted in furnaces separating the mercury from the sulfur, in order to obtain the quicksilver. Quicksilver was collected and placed in flasks that weighed approximately 75 pounds [Ref: www.historysanjose.org/neighborhoods/.../index.html].
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