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Colorful Cripple Creek
(Colorado)
From the book "The F. John Barlow
Mineral Collection"
Copyright 1996 by Sanco Ltd.
"Permission granted by SANCO LTD"
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Cripple Creek was the scene
of the last great gold rush in the continental United States and for
good reason. The ores at Cripple Creek are decidedly different from
anything encountered in California or elsewhere in the West.
Instead of native gold in quartz veins, the Cripple Creek ores were
mainly "gold tellurides," sylvanite and calaverite. And instead of being
in quartz they had invaded the fractured phonolite plug of a huge
caldera along with fluorite and other unusual associates.
Named for a creek in which a calf had fallen and broken a leg, Cripple
Creek was discovered by Bob Womack, who like John Marshall of Sutter's
Mill died virtually penniless. Womack was a cowboy and sometimes
prospector. He was stubbornly convinced that the hills behind Pike's
Peak held a bonanza in gold. Almost to no avail, he prospected,
displaying what he found in store windows in Colorado Springs which was
by then a vital city. Finally, he hit the El Paso Load and the rush was
on.
Noteworthy names that emerged from this area include Jack Dempsey, who
was born in nearby Manassa, and George de la Bouglise, noted collector
of crystallized gold, who was a milling expert here. Much of his
collection constitutes the heart of the great Harvard gold collection, a
specimen from which now resides in the Barlow collection.
Another famous name was Spencer Penrose, who rose to fame in Colorado
railroading. Yet another was Winfield Scott Stratton, whose Independence
Mine was one of the bonanzas. Then there was the Cresson Mine and its
rich gold-lined cavern.
One story about Stratton occurred early in his mining career. A
carpenter by trade, he developed the Independence Mine, a marginal
operation at best. Stratton gradually lost confidence in the property
and finally decided to lease it out. The lease was signed and the day
before it was to go into effect, Stratton was in the mine cleaning up.
Going into a small tunnel he had thought to work but never had, he
stumbled onto a vein so rich he realized the lessee would be instantly
rich if he found it. Carefully covering it up, Stratton left the mine
and crossed his fingers.
Six months later, the lessee had still not found that vein, or anything
else noteworthy. The night before the lease was up, Stratton was sitting
with the lessee in front of a fireplace of a local hotel. The lessee,
disgusted that he hadn't struck it rich, pulled out the lease and in
effect said, "I've had enough. Here is the lease." Stratton was so shook
up at his good fortune that he could not reach out for the paper for
fear his shaking hand would give him away. He simply waved a hand toward
the blazing fire and said, "Toss it in there." Stratton extracted some
nine million dollars in gold from the "worthless" Independence.
The Cresson Mine is a story unto itself. During underground operations a
cavity was opened that was as big as a room and whose walls were fully
lined with crystals of gold, calaverite and sylvanite. The owners
promptly put a steel door on the tunnel and proceeded to scrape a
million and a half in gold off the walls. Some geode!
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