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Death Valley
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Notes
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While gold and silver were both mined in the Funeral and Panamint Mountains, the most profitable mineral to be extracted from Death Valley in the nineteenth century was borax and William Tell Coleman's Harmony Borax Company was the most famous of the borax operations. It reached its zenith in the mid-1880s and produced more revenue than all of the gold and silver mines in Death Valley had produced up until then. A large ranch was established at the mouth of Furnace Creek to help support the work force and livestock. The famous twenty mule teams hauled the white gold out of Death Valley. The hey day of hard rock gold mining in Death Valley occurred at the turn of the century when the boom town Ballarat attracted prospectors from far and wide. In 1904 while the mines around Ballarat ware in decline Ed Cross and Shorty Harris discovered gold on Bullfrog Mountain. Once again a stampede of prospectors followed and once again a town was created overnight in the desert - this time Rhyolite.
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At the height of the Bullfrog gold rush Death Valley Scotty appeared on the scene. In an age of flamboyant characters Scotty was one of the most intriguing. After a colorful life which included working for Wild Bill Cody's Wild West Show, Scotty bamboozled Albert M. Johnson, the owner/president of the National Life Insurance Company into investing in an imaginary mine in Death Valley. On a trip to investigate his investment, Johnson found the valley's climate relieved a serious health problem that had plagued him for a long time. Later, when Johnson learned the truth about the mine, he hired Scotty to nominally oversee the construction and management of Death Valley Ranch which was to become the Johnson residence in Grapevine Canyon. For years thereafter, Scotty continued to tell stories about his mine and Johnson let him do it. The two men became friends.
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In 1906 there was a brief hope that copper could be profitably mined on the edge of Death Valley. The town of Greenwater was born in 1906 and went into decline soon thereafter when it was learned that the ore was not rich enough to pay for its extraction.. Greenwater became known as the "monumental mining-stock swindle of the century. In 1907 tourists began visiting Death Valley and "Alkali Bill" operated the Death Valley Chug Line to transport them by automobile from the railroad 45 miles across the valley to Greenwater. A road was graded across the valley and a road house was established at Stovepipe Wells by James Clark. In 1908 the automobile was making it possible for tourists to routinely visit the valley - their only concerns related to the weather and the availability of water for themselves and their radiators..
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Death Valley also produced a rock that turned to water when heated, and a mud that cured all manner of diseases caused by fever. More legitimate and practical finds included old fashioned Epsom salt as well as a wide variety of other minerals including precious gems, lead, manganese, tungsten, antimony, potash, alum, gypsum, sulphur, marble, talc, and clay. With the exception of the mundane lead, clay, and talc, none of these yielded great profit, but they periodically sparked interest and investment anew in Death Valley. In addition a number of prospectors kept looking for gold and silver well into the new century. The Ashford Mill is a relic of that period and its ruins are still visible today. World War I increased the value of a few of the minerals, particularly antimony, but generally speaking mining was over in Death Valley by the end of the war.
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About the same time that the automobile made travel into Death Valley easier, writers and the movie industry began to take an interest in the valley. In 1924 Zane Grey's Wanderer of the Wasteland was produced by Paramount Pictures. It was one of Hollywood's first all-color productions and it presented Death Valley to a wide audience. In May 1926 Herman William Eichbaum built a toll road to Stovepipe Wells where he built Death Valley's first tourist resort. Three months later the Borax Consolidated company opened its own luxury resort at Furnace Creek. In 1927 borax operations were halted in Death Valley and the company's staff housing was converted into Furnace Creek Ranch which offered more modest tourist facilities. By 1929 ten thousand tourists were visiting Death Valley each year. Tourism was generating over a million dollars in annual revenue.
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On February 11, 1933, President Herbert Hoover signed a proclamation that established Death Valley National Monument.
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