Twenty-mule teams were teams of eighteen mules and two horses attached to large wagons that transported borax out of Death Valley from 1883 to 1889. They traveled from mines across the Mojave Desert to the nearest railroad spur, 165 miles (275 km) away in Mojave. The routes were from the Harmony and Amargosa Borax Works to Daggett, California, and later Mojave, California. After Harmony and Amargosa shut down in 1888, the mule team's route was moved to the mines at Borate, 3 miles east of Calico, back to Daggett. There they worked from 1891 until 1898 when they were replaced by the Borate and Daggett Railroad.
20 Mule Team Borax is a brand of cleaner manufactured in the United States by The Dial Corporation, a subsidiary of Henkel. The product is named after the 20-mule teams that were used by William Tell Coleman's company to move borax out of Death Valley, California, to the nearest rail spur between 1883 and 1889.
Francis Marion Smith was an American miner, business magnate and civic builder in the Mojave Desert, the San Francisco Bay Area, and Oakland, California.
The Pacific Coast Borax Company (PCB) was a United States mining company founded in 1890 by the American borax magnate Francis "Borax" Smith, the "Borax King".
The Borate and Daggett Railroad was a 3 ft narrow gauge railroad built to carry borax in the Mojave Desert. The railroad ran about 11 miles from Daggett, California, US, to the mining camp of Borate, three miles to the east of Calico.
Borax is Sodium borate, a boron-containing mineral.
The Oasis at Death Valley, formerly called Furnace Creek Inn and Ranch Resort, is a luxury resort in Furnace Creek, on private land within the boundaries of California's Death Valley National Park. It is owned and operated by Xanterra Parks and Resorts.
The Harmony Borax Works is located in Death Valley at Furnace Creek Springs, then called Greenland. It is now located within Death Valley National Park in Inyo County, California. It is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Smith Mountain, 5,915 feet (1,803 m), is a peak in the Black Mountains of the Amargosa Range in Death Valley National Park in California.
Evelyn is an unincorporated community in Inyo County, California. It is located on the Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad 5 miles (8 km) south-southeast of Eagle Mountain, at an elevation of 1880 feet.
Lila C is a former settlement in Inyo County, California. It was located 6.25 miles (10 km) southwest of Death Valley Junction, at an elevation of 2562 feet.
Ryan (formerly known as Devar is an unincorporated community in Inyo County, California. A former mining community and company town, Ryan is situated at an elevation of 3,045 feet in the Amargosa Range, 8 miles northeast of Dante's View and 15 miles southeast of Furnace Creek.
Gerstley is a former settlement in Inyo County, California.
Thorkildsen may refer to:
Teel's Marsh is a playa in Nevada, United States. It was the site of "Borax" Smith's first borax works at Marietta, Nevada in 1872, and became the start of his operations that soon became the largest borax operation in the world.
Richard C. Baker was the British business partner of Francis Marion "Borax" Smith and eventually became president of the Pacific Coast Borax Company and the Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad.
Columbus Marsh is a playa in Nevada, United States. William Troup discovered cottonball borax at the site in 1870 or 1871. Joseph Mosheimer and Emile K. Stevenot who operated one of the borax concentrating plants at Columbus hired Francis Marion Smith to cut wood for their plant on nearby Miller Mountain in the Candelaria Hills. Smith subsequently discovered borax himself at Teel's Marsh, where he had sufficient financial success to expand and acquire the borax works at Columbus himself in 1880.
The Rio Tinto Boron Mine in Boron, California is California's largest open-pit mine and the largest borax mine in the world, producing nearly half the world's borates. Ore reserves are sufficient for production through at least 2050. It is operated by the Borax division of the Rio Tinto Group.
