A Headframe to the Sky

By Steven Wade Veatch

Faint traces of a wagon road in backcountry

curve to a gold mine hidden in the trees.

The mine’s headframe reaches to the sky—

a crown of confidence on unbreakable dreams.

 

The ore sorting house rusts through time

while moss invades stone foundations.

Blue pines rock and wild grasses tip in the wind.

Gray clouds nod in the distance.

 

Miners once made their way with burning candles

toward rhythmic clangs of hammers and drills,

while stepping aside for donkey-drawn ore cars

running on narrow rails deep underground.

 

Two men, with blistered hands,

pounded steel that drilled the rock

then packed dynamite in the holes they made.

A rattail of fuse detonated a round with a thundering blast.

 

Timbers in tight embrace held the Earth in place

as spectral Tommyknockers scurried and hid

in opaque blackness beyond the candle flame

while golden veins and rich ore wait discovery. 

 

Now the gold mine is silent, the sheave wheel stopped.

The underground workings—still as held breath.

The mine a monument to how the West was won.

A progress secured by the lure of gold.

 

Morning shadows cover yellow spills of flowers

where deer dip down to browse nearby.

The mine still makes its claim on the land

Harkening to better days and simpler ways.

Empire Lee mine, Cripple Creek mining district.

Photo by Gene Mourning, courtesy of the

Western Museum of Mining and Industry.

Keeper of Cripple Creek Light: the Miners’ Candlesticks

 By Steven Wade Veatch

Miners in the Cripple Creek mining district once drilled, blasted, and mucked deep underground by the light of a candle. Not only did these candles illuminate their work areas, but they also provided shadows for Tommyknockers to hide in. 

In Cripple Creek, as in other mining districts, mine owners supplied miners with candles; however, they required miners to buy the holders for the candles. Miners called these holders “candlesticks.” Most candlesticks were mass-produced and sold through mining supply stores and catalogs—even Sears and Roebuck sold miners’ candlesticks. These generally had similar designs, but there were a large number of patented variations. 

To make it easier for miners to replace damaged or worn out candlesticks, a purveyor of these basic devices visited Cripple Creek and other mining towns and peddled them directly to the miners. In figure 1, a man is selling candlesticks to a group of miners. He used two burros to pack the miners’ candlesticks from town to town.

Figure 1. A man, next to the donkey in the right side of the photo, is selling candlesticks to miners at a mine in the Cripple Creek mining district. Candlesticks are piled on the back of one burro (right side of photo) for display. A group of miners, some carrying lunch pails, gather around him. The photo, by an unknown photographer, is dated November 12, 1897. From the Olla D. Burris collection. Photo courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

        An entire industry developed producing mining candles made from stearic acid and paraffin wax. The stearic candles used in Cripple Creek had many benefits: They emitted little smoke and were suited for some of the poor ventilation found in underground mining. These candles gave a steady source of light and were not easily blown out in a draft. Candles were easy to handle and simpler to transport than oil lamps. Mine owners viewed candles as less of a fire risk than oil lamps. A miner could easily put out a candle that tumbled over before it set mine timbers on fire. If a miner knocked over an oil lamp its destructive flames spread rapidly. 

Candle manufacturers set the standard diameter of candles at 0.75 inches. Candle lengths varied, but averaged about 9 inches (Bartos, 2010). Manufacturers wrapped candles in sets of six and packed them into boxes of 120 or 240 candles. The cost of a 240-unit box was between $3 and $5 (Bartos, 2010). Miners burned through three or four candles per day (Bartos, 2010).

Figure 2. Miners with burning candles in their candlesticks take a short break while in a stope in the Half Moon mine. Unknown photographer and date. From the Olla D. Burris collection. Photo courtesy of the Cripple Creek District Museum.

        Candlesticks used in metal mining began to appear in California in 1860 and were used in mines throughout the American West (Bartos, 2010). The traditional miners’ candlestick was simply an iron spike, about one-quarter inch in diameter, averaging 12 inches in length. Miners hammered the iron spike on candlesticks into a mine timber or a fracture in a rock surface (Weicksel, n.d.). A miner with a burning candle in a candlestick could put it close to where he needed light to work. At the end opposite of the candlestick’s point is a loop that acts as a handle (see figure 3). A circular holder (thimble) near the handle or center of the spike holds the candle perpendicular to the spike. Next to the candleholder is a hook to hang the candlestick on rocks when the miner could not find any mine timbers or rock cracks to drive the spike into. It was also used to attach the candle to his cap.

Figure 3. Diagram of a typical miner’s candlestick. Source: Wilson and Bobrink, 1982.

        Candlesticks came in many varieties and sizes: Some were handmade by a local blacksmith, homemade by a miner, manufactured, unpatented or patented (table 1 shows candlestick patents held by Pikes Peak area inventors). Some candlesticks folded up around a central pivot point, allowing a miner to slip it into his pocket as he walked into the mine (Pohs, 1989). Others were simple in their design (see figure 4).

Figure 4. The March 1899 patent design for William Pleasants’ candlestick.
Pleasants was a resident of Víctor. Source: Ramsdell and Wagner, 1982.

Table 1. Miner's Candlesticks Patents As applied for by residents of the Cripple Creek Mining District, Colorado Springs, and Colorado City, Colorado.
Applicant	Residence	Date	Patent No.
William Lincicum and Charles F. Lewis	Colorado City	Nov. 1895	549,925
William H. Pleasants*	Victor	Mar. 1899	D-30,406
William H. Pleasants	Victor	June,1899	D-30,991
Amede Bernier	Victor	Aug. 1899	631,270
Christopher Peacock*	Altman	Aug. 1900	656,209
Charles Cornell and Felix John Troughton	Victor	Jan. 1901	665,067
John B. Lindahl*	Colorado Springs	Oct. 1905	801,465
Harry D. Pelham and Charles P. Kaba*	Colorado Springs	Aug. 1913	1,069,170
*Known to have been manufactured. Source: compiled by Ed Hunter from Ramsdell and Wagner, 1982.

Figure 5. Advertisement for the Lindahl candlestick patented by John Lindahl in 1905. Lindahl lived in Colorado Springs. The candlestick was adjustable, reversible, interchangeable, and featured a case containing matches that replaced the loop handle in this model.
From the S.W. Veatch postcard collection.

        The two largest candlestick manufacturers were Nathan Varney of Denver and the Ludlow–Saylor Wire Company of St. Louis. A 1911 catalog advertised Varney candlesticks that cost six dollars per dozen (50 cents each). More elaborate candlesticks advertised in Mining Science in 1914 cost $1.50 each.

Candlesticks were simple, reliable, and easy to use. Cripple Creek miners used candlesticks for many years until carbide lamps and electric cap lamps made them obsolete in the early decades of the twentieth century. 

Miners found other uses for candlesticks. Crafty high graders used a hollow area in the curved handles of specially made or modified candlesticks to conceal high grade gold ore with candle wax or mud before they went home (Pohs, 1995).With their sharp, piercing points, candlesticks were used as weapons to settle arguments in the heat of the moment (Gosling,1969). In 1903, Colorado’s governor James H. Peabody escaped being killed by an assassin at a meeting he was scheduled to attend. The assassin intended to use the spike of a concealed candlestick as the murder weapon. The governor skipped the meeting and instead enjoyed a football game at the Colorado School of Mines (Pohs, 1995). 

Today, candlesticks can be found in private and museum collections. They are a symbol of the underground miner and the hard work he did. 

Acknowledgments

        I thank the Colorado Springs Oyster Club critique group for reviewing the manuscript, and Dr. Bob Carnein for his valuable comments and help in improving this paper. 

References and Further Reading:

Bartos, P., 2010, A light in the darkness: U.S. mine lamps, the early years—candlesticks, oil lamps, and safety lamps: Mining History Journal, vol. 17, p. 45-63.

Gosling, E. M.,1969, Miners’ Candlesticks: Spinning Wheel, vol. 25, Jan-Feb, p. 21.

Pohs, H. A., 1989, Early Underground Mine Lamps: Mine Lighting from Antiquity to Arizona: Museum Monograph No. 6, Tucson, Arizona Historical Society, p. 7-16.

Pohs, H. A., 1995, The Miner’s Flame Light Book: Denver, Flame Publishing Company, p. 121-214.

Ramsdell, J. and N. S. Wagner, 1982, Patents, Miners’ Candlesticks: Carson City, NV,  privately published.

Weicksel, S., n.d., Mining Charity, Retrieved from https://americanhistory.si.edu/fr/node/47976 on 5/18/2021.

Wilson, W. E. and T. Bobrink, 1984, A Collector’s Guide to Antique Miners’ Candlesticks: Tucson, The Mineralogical Record. 

Cripple Creek’s Mule Skinners

By Steven Wade Veatch

In the late 1890s, Cripple Creek was the site of Colorado’s last gold rush and soon became known as the World’s Greatest Gold Camp. Ore from Cripple Creek’s gold mines was hauled in large wooden wagons by four or six mules or horses to a team. Skilled drivers, known as mule skinners or simply skinners, could “skin” or outwit stubborn mules and compel them over rugged roads hauling ore, goods, and materials in and out of the gold camp.

Some mules were as mean as a surprised grizzly. Other mules were more obliging to the skinner. A good skinner could control his team and drive heavy, cargo-laden wagons along winding mountain roads raising dust at two to two-and-a-half miles per hour.

A group of scrubbed up, dressed up mule skinners relax on a boulder in a rugged mountain clearing. In the background is a large tent and several horses grazing in the meadow. These skinners worked for A.E. Carlton’s Colorado Trading and Transfer Company in Cripple Creek. By the time this photo was taken (1906), the company had a thriving business transporting ore from the mines to the Midland terminal railhead. Photo © Cripple Creek District Museum.

A mule skinner’s job was arduous. It took dogged determination and an understanding of a team of mules to make an efficient driving outfit. The work, sometimes dangerous and always hard, had long hours, starting at five in the morning and lasting long after the sunset. Young, ready men who could take the punishing work performed this job the best. Though no mules were ever skinned, these men would boast, “I can pop my initials on a mule’s behind.”

Most of the skinners were as lonely as a seagull in an Iowa cornfield, and some skinners were as mean and stubborn as their mule. The skinners, in their quest for company, headed for the dancehalls that lined Cripple Creek’s notorious Meyers Avenue.

This imagined scene applies to so many of these trips:
It’s Saturday night, the sun has gone down behind Mt. Pisgah and a full moon is beginning to rise at the bottom of the sky. Coyotes prowl behind Mineral Hill in howling packs while the mournful whistle of the Midland Terminal locomotive wails through the city of Cripple Creek. 

A chill shivers the night air as a small cadre of mule skinners walk down Bennet Avenue on their way to Meyers Avenue to spend the evening in a dance hall—a place more alluring than the dream of buried gold. It’s time for a big night. On Bennett Avenue, they walk past Kurth’s music store and peek through the window at the phonographs and pianos on display. The skinners continue to a grocery where the pungent smells of coffee, cheese, and pickles in this cornucopia of plenty spill out onto the street. One skinner walks in to buy a plug of Brown’s Mule chewing tobacco and carefully counts out the money for the grocer. Next, they go past a hardware store where the window displays new picks and shovels with white-pine handles. As the skinners turn onto Meyers Avenue, a cat creeps along the boardwalk and then zooms into the dark alley. The skinners are as free as the night and stand together looking at the lights that flash and flare along the rip-roaring pleasure street. The wooden stomp of horse hoofs, the rolling wheels of buggies, and the sound of music fills the night air.

The group of skinners choose a likely dancehall to enter, a hopping hive of humanity. The young men step into the smoke-filled, raucous dancehall and eagerly part with their hard-earned cash. Girls bring whiskey and beer to miners sitting at the tables. Men jam around the bar while drinking and talking about gold mines. The piano player pounds away while other musicians play their fiddles. Most of the dances were too complicated for the skinners, unlike the other fast-drinking, fancy-stepping clientele, so they wait for the musicians to play the Monterey, a more straightforward dance they knew.

The interior lights illuminate the dancehall girls who appear as enchanting beauties—a sight for the skinner’s wearied eyes. The skinners, with work-roughened hands and hammering hearts, each grab a girl and step out on the wooden dance floor where they join the others, dancing to the band’s rendition of Mule Skinner’s Delight. They go around and around in a circle—markedly self-aware—as the caller proclaims, “honors to your partner, honors to the corner, swing your partner and all promenade.” When they finish the dance, the skinners and their girls line up at the bar for a few drinks. The mule skinners, full of brag, talk about their mules or horses and the perils their jobs until a work-worn miner yells: “another Mule Skinner’s Delight!” The dance was on, with skinners spinning in a whirl as a happy reverie fills their minds and the night drifts on.

The mule skinners in the Cripple Creek Mining District played an essential role in bringing goods to the district and hauling gold ore to mills for processing or to railroads for shipment. The skinners did not disappear like yesterday’s snow but stepped into the pages of history. They even became folk icons when, in 1930, Jimmy Rodgers and George Vaughn wrote a song called Blue Yodel No. 8, also known as Mule Skinner Blues. Bill Monroe’s 1939 version of Mule Skinner Blues became a hit, and since then a variety of recording artists, including bluegrass and folk musicians, have performed the song. These songs immortalized the skinners who played a vital part in Cripple Creek, the “World’s Greatest Gold Camp.”