Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1910 — ANCIENT COPPER MINE. [ARTICLE]

ANCIENT COPPER MINE.

Deposit* Fonnd hy Phoenician* Near Gibraltar 3,000 Years Ago. The most ancient copper mine in the world is the Rio Tinto, in Spain. Three thousand years ago the Phoenicians found just beyond Gibraltar extensive deposits of copper ore, says the New York Times. Copper was one of the most desired metals of those days, and the Phoenicians, skillful artificers, set to extracting it. When their sea trade was usurped by Carthaginians several centuries later ore from the mine was carried _to the various ancien t trading ports. When Carthage fell, the

Romans took possession and worked the Rio Tinto for centuries. Then came Goths, and later Moors, digging more gold out of the Iberian mountain side. When Ferdinand and Isabella drove the Moors out of Spain the crown took possession of the Rio Tinto mine; and leased It from time to time to adventurers from various countries of Europe; in the seventeenth century It was leased to a Swede and later to a Frenchman; In the eighteenth century to a company of Englishmen. During the French invasion the mine was abandoned to be reopened by the crown about 100 years ago. In 1873 English bankers offered a good round price, and the Spanish government turned the property over to them; a public company was formed and the shares offered investors. The yearly output was enormously_ increased, and since the English took possession some $30,000,000 worth of copper has been mined. In 1906 and 1907 dividends of $10,000,000 were declared, the largest ever paid by any copper mine in the world. The steam shovel has added generations to the life of Rio Tinto. As the property has been entered deeper and deeper the ore has become poorer—rich ores were all extracted years ago. Six years since, when the owners were puzzling over mining the low-grade ore at a profit, along came an American with an idea. A few steam shovels, he showed, would do the work of thousands of Spanish miners, and even though the miners were paid only 6 cents a day steam shovels would save much money. The English timidly sent to the states for two shovels; now American shovels are grunting and snorting all over Rio Tinto, within sight of the old slag piles of the Romans, Carthaginians and Phoenicians.