 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(October 2008) |
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Locale | Shasta County, California |
| Dates of operation | 1908–1930s |
| Technical | |
| Track gauge | 4 ft 8+1⁄2 in (1,435 mm) standard gauge |
| Length | 15 mi (24 km) |
The Sacramento Valley and Eastern Railway (SV&E) was a railway company that operated in Shasta County, California from 1908 until the early 1930s.
From 1908 until the early 1930s, the town of Pitt (now under Shasta Lake) was the terminus for the standard gauge Sacramento Valley and Eastern Railway, which extended from the Southern Pacific 15 miles (24 km) up the Pitt River northeast to the town of Delmar. Although stated to be a common carrier, the SV&E was solely dependent on the success of the mine and smelter at Bully Hill, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) above the railroad’s easternmost terminus. [1] The decline in copper prices and lack of revenue led to the closure of the railroad.
The Bully Hill and Squaw Creek areas of Shasta County had been worked for gold in the 1850s and 1860s and quartz in the 1880s, the more precious of the region's mineral resources. In July 1899, a colorful New York financier, Captain Joseph Raphael De Lamar, purchased the Bully Hill mines for about $200,000 and set about building a smelter of 400 ton capacity and developing the area for copper. A 30" gauge railroad (1.5 miles long) was used to connect level 3 of the mine with the smelter, using a diminutive Shay locomotive bought new for the project, which became informally known as the DeLamar Railroad. The smelting plant began operation in 1901.
In 1901 DeLamar built an electrolytic refinery in Chrome, New Jersey to handle the product of the Bully Hill smelter in the form of flat ingots of blister copper. This was the first operation in the Bully Hill area that met with any kind of success. However a major setback was the lack of good transportation. Freight was hauled in and out by wagons on crude dirt roads over Bear Mountain Summit, 13 miles (21 km) to the railhead of the Anderson and Bella Vista Railroad at Bella Vista.
Copper Prices were rising and the property looked attractive enough to the General Electric Company of New York, who purchased it in 1905 and continued to operate the smelter at capacity. To alleviate the transportation problem, General Electric commenced grading in 1907 for the Sacramento Valley and Eastern Railway. Sometime in 1908, the 15.5-mile (24.9 km) railroad was opened to the public and, to recover some of the initial investment in its construction, full freight and passenger service was offered. A new 2-6-2T tank engine was ordered from Baldwin Locomotive Works in Pennsylvania that same year, although a leased SP 4-4-0 was used to open the line.
The railroad was started quite late in the "copper boom" and the railway's fortunes turned after two years. The open roasting of the ores prior to smelting, necessary because of the high sulfur content, released clouds of smoke and toxic fumes, which had disastrous effects on any plant life that came in contact with it. In July 1910, following the filing of a suit by the U.S. government regarding damage being done to the nearby national forests, the Bully Hill smelter was closed down, never to be reopened by General Electric. The cost of installing mechanical roasters was too costly in light of the now-declining copper prices.
Meanwhile, the SV&E continued providing a service with a "skunk" gasoline motor car being used in later years to carry passengers, mail and express from Pitt out to the SP line. While the smelter business was shaky, there was at least a less-than-carload business of sorts with milk, farm equipment, papers, and hay being handled by the line.
In 1917, Walter Arnstein, president of the Oakland and Antioch Railroad, and owner of the Nevada County Narrow Gauge, secured a long-term lease and the mining of copper and zinc resumed. DeLamar's original 30" gauge railroad was utilized to transfer the ore to DeLamar where it was loaded onto standard gauge cars and shipped via the Sacramento Valley and Eastern and the Southern Pacific to the Mammoth Smelter at Kennet (now under Shasta Lake). Smelting operations were revived at Bully Hill in early 1920, only to be stopped again following declining prices in 1922.
In 1920, Shasta Zinc and Copper Company acquired the mine and smelter area and in 1924, consolidated several mines in the area, including the Afterthought at Ingot, from which an aerial tramway was constructed in 1925 connecting it with the smelter at Bully Hill, about 8 miles (13 km) away. A material known as Shasta zinc oxide was produced, which was an ingredient in paint and rubber tires among other things. The final product was shipped out via SV&E and SP to San Francisco where it was placed on a steamship to be sent to Baltimore.
Following steady declines in copper and zinc prices in 1927, the Bully Hill operation was shut down once again and the SV&E became idle. The Sacramento Valley & Eastern was not listed in the 1930 Official Guide of the Railways and was abandoned entirely following the collapse of the bridge across the Sacramento River just east of Pitt during the floods of early 1939.
Today no trace of the right of way remains since it was submerged under the waters of Shasta Lake in the early 1940s.
Superior is a town in Pinal County, Arizona. According to the 2020 census, the population of the town is 2,407. Superior was founded as a mining town for the Silver King and the later Magma mines; silver was mined at first, and then transitioned to copper. Currently, exploitation of the huge Resolution Copper deposit is being explored.
Jerome is a town in the Black Hills of Yavapai County in the U.S. state of Arizona. Founded in the late 19th century on Cleopatra Hill overlooking the Verde Valley, Jerome is located more than 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level. It is about 100 miles (160 km) north of Phoenix along State Route 89A between Sedona and Prescott. Supported in its heyday by rich copper mines, it was home to more than 10,000 people in the 1920s. As of the 2010 census, its population was 444. It is now known for its tourist attractions, such as its "ghost town" status and local wineries.
Tooele is a city in Tooele County in the U.S. state of Utah. The population was 35,742 at the 2020 census. It is the county seat of Tooele County. Located approximately 30 minutes southwest of Salt Lake City, Tooele is known for Tooele Army Depot, for its views of the nearby Oquirrh Mountains and the Great Salt Lake.
The Utah & Northern Railway is a defunct railroad that was operated in the Utah Territory and later in the Idaho Territory and Montana Territory in the western United States during the 1870s and 1880s. It was the first railroad in Idaho and in Montana. The line was acquired by a Union Pacific Railroad subsidiary, the Oregon Short Line, and is today operated by the Union Pacific Railroad as the Ogden Subdivision, part of the Pocatello Subdivision, and the Montana Subdivision.
Teck Resources Limited, known as Teck Cominco until late 2008, is a diversified natural resources company headquartered in Vancouver, British Columbia, that is engaged in mining and mineral development, including coal for the steelmaking industry, copper, zinc, and energy. Secondary products include lead, silver, gold, molybdenum, germanium, indium and cadmium. Teck Resources was formed from the amalgamation of Teck and Cominco in 2001.
The Nevada Northern Railway was a railroad in the U.S. state of Nevada, built primarily to reach a major copper producing area in White Pine County, Nevada. The railway, constructed in 1905–06, extended northward about 140 miles (230 km) from Ely to connections with the Western Pacific Railroad at Shafter and Southern Pacific Railroad at Cobre. In 1967 NN reported 40 million net ton-miles of revenue freight on 162 miles (261 km) of line.
The Duluth, South Shore and Atlantic Railway (DSS&A) was an American railroad serving the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and the Lake Superior shoreline of Wisconsin. It provided service from Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan, and St. Ignace, Michigan, westward through Marquette, Michigan, to Superior, Wisconsin, and Duluth, Minnesota. A branchline stretched northward from Nestoria, Michigan, up to the Keweenaw Peninsula and terminating at Houghton, Michigan, with two branches extending further to Calumet, Michigan, and Lake Linden, Michigan.
The Copper Basin Railway is an Arizona short-line railroad that operates from a connection with the Union Pacific Railroad (UP) at Magma to Winkelman, in 54 miles (87 km) of length. The railroad also has a 7-mile (11 km) branch line that runs from Ray Junction to Ray, Arizona. There was formerly an interchange with the San Manuel Arizona Railroad (SMA) at Hayden. The CBRY exists primarily to serve a copper mine. L. S. “Jake” Jacobson was the President and Chief Operating Officer, retiring in 2020 after more than 30 years in his position. In summer 2006, ASARCO Copper Corporation purchased the entire railroad.
La Oroya is a city on the River Mantaro and capital of the Yauli Province, located in the Department of Junin in central Peru. It is situated on the eastern watershed of the Andes at an altitude of 3,745 m, some 176 km east-north-east of the national capital, Lima. La Oroya is the location of a smelting operation that earned the town a place on the Blacksmith Institute's 2007 report on "The World's Worst Polluted Places". It is also the eastern endpoint of the Central Highway of Peru.
Mount Isa Mines Limited ("MIM") operates the Mount Isa copper, lead, zinc and silver mines near Mount Isa, Queensland, Australia as part of the Glencore group of companies. For a brief period in 1980, MIM was Australia's largest company. It has pioneered several significant mining industry innovations, including the Isa Process copper refining technology, the Isasmelt smelting technology, and the IsaMill fine grinding technology, and it also commercialized the Jameson Cell column flotation technology.
Heath Steele Mines, situated 60 km (37 mi) northwest of Newcastle, New Brunswick, Canada, at the headwaters of the Tomogonops and Little Rivers, was a large and productive copper, lead and zinc mine which operated from 1956 to 1999. The mine was an economic cornerstone of Miramichi communities throughout this period.
The California, Shasta and Eastern Railway was a 15 miles (24 km) shortline railroad which operated, for nearly 40 years, between Anderson and Bella Vista, California with no greater aspirations then being a glorified mill spur. Briefly around 1906 however, the road basked in the limelight of the mighty E.H. Harriman who considered, and then discarded, the idea of incorporating it into one of his "paper" railroads projected through the region.
Silver City, Pinos Altos and Mogollon Railroad was a 2 ft narrow gauge railway serving copper mines along the Continental Divide in the mountains of southwestern New Mexico. The communities of Silver City and Pinos Altos developed as 19th century miners recovered easily extracted gold and silver from ore deposits of the area. Standard-gauge Santa Fe Railroad reached Silver City in 1886, and SC, PA&M was incorporated 24 August 1889 to build a railway north to Mogollon, New Mexico. Construction was limited to 5 miles (8.0 km) of grading until Wisconsin-based Comanche Mining and Smelting purchased the railroad and the Pinos Altos mining claims of George Hearst in 1903 after horse-drawn ore transport became uneconomical. The Silver City smelter burned shortly after purchase, but was rebuilt with three blast furnaces and a reverberatory furnace to handle 225 tons of ore per day. Two Shay locomotives were moved to Silver City in August 1905 from the Gilpin tramway of Gilpin County, Colorado. The railroad was built through iron and limestone mines on Chloride Flat west of Silver City. The limestone was used as a flux for smelting the copper ore.
The Kennecott Utah Copper rail line was an electric railroad in Salt Lake County, Utah. It was managed by the Kennecott Utah Copper Corporation and connected the Bingham Canyon Mine with its smelter at Garfield. The rail line has been replaced by a system of conveyors and a 17-mile-long (27 km) slurry pipeline. Current rail operations by Kennecott Utah Copper LLC only occur in the area of the smelter, on a remnant of what was a vast rail network.
Spenceville was a ranching, farming and mining community located in the southwestern part of Nevada County, California, on Spenceville Road just east of Waldo Road, about 17 miles from Grass Valley. Its elevation was about 400 feet. The former townsite is now part of the Spenceville Wildlife Area.
The American Fork Railroad was a 16-mile (26 km) long 3 ft narrow gauge railway from American Fork to Forest City in Utah, which operated from 1872 to 1878.
Joseph Raphael De Lamar was a prominent mine owner and operator in the western United States and Canada, as well as a financier and speculator, from the late 1870s until his death in 1918.
Coronado Railroad was a 20 in railroad which operated in a copper mining region of eastern Arizona.
The Southwestern Railroad is a Class III railroad operating since 1990, and until 2017 consisted of two unconnected railroad sections in New Mexico, with no shared functions. These and a third section in the Texas panhandle and Oklahoma, now closed, all operated separately. Since January 2017, only the Whitewater Division is operated by Southwestern.
The United Verde and Pacific Railway was a 3 ft narrow gauge railroad that operated from 1895 to 1920 in what became Yavapai County in the U.S. state of Arizona. William A. Clark built the 26-mile (42 km) line to link his copper mine and smelter in Jerome to an existing branch of the Santa Fe Railway system. Clark eventually replaced the line with three 4 ft 8+1⁄2 instandard gauge rail lines after building a new smelter and company town in Clarkdale.
