d in 1913, a silent movie was filmed at the site by a prominent California movie c
ompany which la
ter merged with
Target Audience
Warner Brothers.
It was the Silver City Reduction
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Works, the prid
e of Silver City and which fro a brief time was a boon to the economy, making mining in the Grant County possible in those early years. Some 60 years later, there is nothing left of the operation. The Silver City Reduction Works went by several names before it was finally scaped. It was originally build by the Hearst family to handle gold and silver ores hauled from their Pinos Altos mines. This were difficult years for the operation, and a final crunch came in 1902. The plans was
- handling just about every
- ore it could get - custom smelting include
- d. And that meant copper was among those ores. Copper, in fact, wa
- s such a vital part of the smelter's daily operations that depres
- sed copper market conditions forced a closure of
- the smelter. That was in April. On June 30, 30,
- 1903, the plant caught fire and was leveled.
- Silver City's hopes were dashed since the whole o
- peration was going to be sold and once again put into
productions.
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The sale took p
lace anyway, and Comanche Mining Smelting Co. was the new owner. The reduction works were build on a larger scale. In 1906, the newspaper had this to say: "The big red building in which this ponderous machinery is housed is 72 feet high and is by far the most imposing structure in theses parts, being 63 feet in width and 122 feet long. "A metallic conveyer will carry the ore from the bins to the large crusher, from whence it will be elevated... the oversize of this going to the picking belt were boys and men will be employed to pick out the different classes of ore that is to go direct to the smelter. "
The water for the mill will b
e pumped from the arroyo, whi
hrough Silver City and past the smelter... The lit
tle Silver City, Pinos Altos & Mogollon railroad hauled ore to this smelter, but only briefly. Comanche was a
bsorbed b
- y Savannah Copper Company which operated the plant for a short time. Even at first, Savannah was caught up in the dream that first captured the Hearst fami
- ly, and later the Comanche Co. Savannah made some improvement at the plan, and the smelter could allegedly handle bet
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ween 250 and 300 tons or ore per day. Like Comanche, Savannah was also interested in buying ores from small mining operations. Again, the Independent - the weekl
y predecessor to the Dai
- ly Press - had this to say in 1908: "The main ore supply will be drawn from the company's mines, but custom ore will be purchased and fair and square treatment accorded the miner," it said. The whole operation - like the narrow-gauge railro
- ad - never really panned out. The operation was idle for sever
- al years until 1913. Then, Romaine Field
- ing and the Lubin Motion Picture Company came to town, and the abandoned smelter ca
ught the director's eye. "Sundy was a
thrilling day for the Silver City people," said t
- he Independent that yea
- r. "The Lubin Co. enacted a drama at the
- smelter below town, blew up the narrow gauge railroad b
- Funding for the instructional team (including travel and per diem costs) and all instructional materials.
ridge and two large water tanks and incidentally furnished amusement for 2,000 people scattered over the surrounding hills watching the interesting events." Fielding directed a mock labor riot at the smelter and 2
00 actors rushed up the hill behind the smelter and set fire to the water ta
