History of the Panaca Quarry Site

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History of the
Panaca Quarry Site
We’ve been around almost 80 years and are still one of the best-kept secrets of the
Southwest. Our customers jealously guard information about where they obtain
their minerals. The placer claims were first discovered in 1930, and a location was
promptly lodged at the county seat along with appropriate filings with the
Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management, etc.
Three
hundred
and
twenty (320) acres, = two
quarter-sections situated
in
Lincoln
County,
Nevada were originally
claimed by local residents
who were informed by
two college students of
the deposit. As the legend
has it, the students were
apparently
conducting
prospecting work for the
railroad during their
summer vacation, to earn
some tuition money, and
woke up one morning to
find their burros had
escaped. Tracking them
some distance, the burros
were eventually encountered with their noses poked down a couple of rabbit holes,
buried almost up to their eyes, oblivious to the approaching prospectors.
Much to their amazement, the two students observed that the animals were eating a
powdery clay substance they had previously observed at distance, but had not
heretofore detoured to investigate. It was soon analyzed, and the basic matrix was
found to be very similar indeed, to the first Montmorillonite deposit so-named
nearly three quarters of a century earlier, in France. Various uses of the clay were
made such as in mineral baths, as bleaching agents (major ingredient of Fuller’s
Earth), and healing poultices for injured livestock.
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Shortly after World War II a consortium of
California and Arizona growers set up a mill
on the west edge of Panaca and began
shipping refined product in 100 lb. sacks by
rail all, over the country.
This enterprise prospered for several years
until the respective California and Arizona
real estate booms caused hundreds of
orchards and fields to be sold and bulldozed
to accommodate the building of new
subdivisions and shopping
centers. Now that all of these
early operators and promoters
are deceased, it is difficult to
obtain many more details, but
these photographs, dated
around 1948, were made
available to us from a
scrapbook kept by the widow
of the first foreman.
A ground-breaking held with
considerable fanfare, received
attention in at least one
newspaper.
The rich silts
pursued by the venture are easily observed within the stratified layers in the background
which form variously-colored chunks that one can fairly easily crumble by hand.
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The exploitation of this colloidal
source, interbedded with high
humus (lignitic silts containing
enviable proportions of fulvic and
humic acid), plus a broad bouquet
of minerals and ions in trace
amounts, has never attained but a
minuscule percentage of its
potential commercial capacity.
After
the
groundbreaking,
excavation
began
almost
immediately, but we have
discovered today that such severe
methods as bulldozing and employing a
steam shovel, are not really necessary to
dig up the soft clay. Once pulverized its
particles can be recovered and sorted by
simple screening.
Largely, the decline in use of natural
composts,
fertilizers
and
soil
amendments, progressively saw their
demise with the onslaught of lessexpensive chemical additives and
substitutes,
becoming
available.
Chemists found that by adding substantial amounts of factory-garnered NPK (Nitrogen,
Phosphorus and Potassium, or those products containing them such as Nitrates,
Phosphates and Potash), generated a quick-fix to lawns and fields withered by the
summer sun. Growth seemed impressive, and at first, so were yields, but the attendant
twin problems, i.e., lack of real nutritional value / diminished tissue protein, and build-up
of toxins in the soil, leading to contamination of streams and other potable water sources,
signaled trouble. Tragically, short-term profits and mere cosmetic, aesthetic appeal of
produce, overshadowed nutritional and environmental concerns which were still nascent
between the Korean and Viet Nam conflicts. The death knell came when the railroad
finally tore up the track between Caliente and Panaca. This was a direct result of the
traditional “lode” types of mines having played out, including for the most part zinc, lead
and nickel mines in Pioche, Nevada, just twelve miles to the north.
Modern soil science--apparently just coming out of its infancy in the early 1970s-ironically had its renaissance in California where developers were racing to smear
millions of cubic yards of asphalt and concrete on top of formerly some of the finest soil
in the nation. The justification for this irreversible, wanton destruction of beautiful farm
country, was that much of the land had reputably been played out by exhausting its trace
mineral storehouse. Rather than re-mineralizing, it was simply more profitable to sell.
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Acid rains exacerbated the situation, accelerated by fossil fuel emissions pouring into the
California sky as population rates at first climbed, then skyrocketed, further gobbling up
arable coastline land.
A few customers remained faithful to the concept of organics and natural soil
amendments, to intelligently go about recovering the soil, but eventually with all of these
forces combining against it, the faltering enterprise in Panaca was eventually leased to
one new group after another, each ultimately throwing in the towel. Several brands
evidenced from pallets of sacks left to rot in the weather near the now dilapidated, once
state-of the art mill appear below.
Customers like J.R. Watkins Company
(Winona, Minnesota) and Nutri-Bio
(Beverly Hills, California) are reported
to have produced and sold millions of
Panaca Montmorillonite capsules per
month under various trade names during
the
1960s.
Remember
“Autry’s
Minerals”? During the mid 1970’s to
late 1980’s, substantial efforts were
rekindled to develop a niche in the
human nutritional industry by the
current
operators’
immediate
predecessors. A few remnants of their
customer bases persist amongst assorted
clientele retained from by-gone years. Chief amongst these
health-conscious revivalists was former BYU football player, and Las Vegas CPA, the
late Clarence Hulse who apparently heard about the deposit from relatives. (A number of
Hulses have resided in Lincoln County over the last several decades, and our files contain
at least one engineering study conducted by a Hulse firm dating from Clarence’s
administration. He headed, and / or formed several successor investment groups that
tried desperately to create and sustain a market that still had not awakened to its
nutritional plight. The enlistment of “Godfather of Clay Minerals Research”, Melchior T.
Dikkers PhD, was not the least of Mr. Hulse’s achievements. www.montmorillonite.org .
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Hulse’s immediate successor, R. J. Collet, ex-Marine Corps
reservist and fighter plane pilot / World War II veteran (from
the Pacific theater) moved to Panaca about 1990. At this time
the health of his good friend and business associate finally
failed as a result of caustic exposure to asbestos. In his early
twenties, Clarence worked graveyard cleaning out steel mill
boilers to support his young family while struggling to earn
enough income to complete his accountancy degree.
Collet, also long-time resident in Las Vegas, shared Hulse’s
enthusiasm, and had a vision of his own, i.e., to revisit the
agricultural need, and address the growing opportunity as a
result of popular outcry, and favorable legislation, pointing to a
revival of the deposit’s broadest utility. Through his company,
International Trace Minerals, Inc., he added two screening plants, improved the loading
dock, fenced-in the present-day yard, and developed the one-ton “jumbo” or tote (ore)
bags filling operation.
Collet contracted local residents to pursue stockpiling of the Montmorillonite for future
screening. He was successful in converting a number of farmers and fertilizer
formulators--particularly in his native California, to try his minerals, and in his advanced
years, pursued this dream while maintaining all the screening equipment, trucks, trailers,
forklifts himself, until his own death in turn, in May of 2002, at age 81.
To date, except for some mail order brands of capsules and tablets for human
consumption, probably 99% of the sales volume has been dedicated to agrarian
disciplines. Major customers include regional fertilizer formulators and commercial
growers, but the mineral complex also enjoys
increasing reception within the veterinary,
livestock, and pet food industries. They buy
it by the truckload, in bulk, and screened into
bags like the ones pictured above. A number
of customers still dabble in capsules and
tablets, use the ingredient in sports drinks, or
other liquefied emulsions.
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Today Window Peak Trace Minerals (a d/b/a Altenberg Media International, Inc.)
operates the quarry and maintains a bungalow with telephone service in Panaca (775)
728-4686, but it is staffed only irregularly when the need arises to work several days in
succession. Cell phone coverage is best through Verizon, and the Chief Operating
Officer, “Joe” may be reached on (435) 313-2411, or by e-mail via
[email protected]
In January of 2003 a shed covering approximately 2400 square feet, plus a container, was
erected on site to serve as a warehouse and equipment storage facility. The concern also
acquired
several
additional pieces of
equipment such as
a huge Caterpillar
front-end
loader
with a 5-cu.yd.+
bucket, and a small
John Deere (“lawn
tractor”).
For
smaller jobs the
little tractor is used
to load a hopper
and
miniature
screening
plant
faintly visible to
the right, behind
and on the north
side of the shed.
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Quarrying is conducted as follows:
1- A tractor with a
farm
implement
suggestive of a
plow
to
the
layman, but called
a ripper, is drug
over approximately
1.5 acres of the
deposit to make up
a batch consisting
of twenty to thirty
(20-30) truckloads.
The depth turned
over is up to three
(3) feet.
2- Next a gargantuan rotovater (some 14 feet long and nearly four feet wide) churns up
the soil, reducing chunk size, and creating powdery furrows.
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The result may be viewed below. If you look closely you can tell the difference
between the ground merely plowed or “ripped”(to the right), and the ground over
which the rotovater has subsequently passed (left side of photo).
If the ground is merely ripped and not
rotovated, then considerable chunks are
left in the mix.
However, these
essentially, may be crushed by hand,
requiring no great pressure, to do so.
Notice the different earth tones due to
stratification within the deposit.
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3- The rotovated sediment is pushed down the hill to the stockpile on the south end of the
yard, forming an impressive dune from which material for truck loading and charging of
the large, blue screening plant’s hopper, is taken.
[Note that the claims are much
more in the nature of alluvial
deposits, (technically, placer
claims), than in veins, hence
the
word
“mining”
is
inappropriate
for
the
extraction activity within the
Panaca deposit.] Absolutely
no blasting or tunneling is
necessary.
In fact, all
operators of the quarry have
had the good fortune to be
able to merely remove the
exposed
stratification
by
simple excavation procedures,
the overburden having long
since been completely eroded
away by weathering after
seismic activity uplifted the
sediment to its present
altitude. It is a vast deposit reaching over 150’ in depth in some areas, and of a consistent
composition. Thus, “strip mining”, likewise, is not the proper appellation for how the
material is removed and stockpiled.
Regarding mineral formation, its chemistry and other attributes of Montmorillonite,
current pricing or business practices of Window Peak Trace Minerals, further maps and
directions, or details about its management, etc., please consult the website
www.chelatedtraceminerals.com, or contact WPTM’s Chief Operating Officer, as
aforesaid, for whatever is required in this regard.
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The subject quarry lies less than two miles to the north of the Panaca Township and is
accessible via well-maintained county roads. Panaca is situated at the junction of
Highways 93 and 319. Highway 93 runs north to Pioche, Ely,
and Twin Falls, Idaho, and south passing through Caliente (a
modest rail head 20 minutes away) for over another 100 miles
to the junction of I-15, thence a mere twenty miles from greater
Las Vegas, Nevada. Twenty-one miles east of Panaca, highway
319 becomes Highway 56 at the Utah border, and another
seventy-five miles distant lies Cedar City. About 11 miles into
Utah from the Nevada border is a picturesque rail stop, the
•
almost ghost town of Modena.
♠
A quaint Mormon (LDS) farming community dating back to the
end of the Civil War, Panaca is the oldest surviving town in
eastern Nevada. Rich in tradition, and endowed with plenty of water--fostering a certain
agricultural beauty, many of Panaca’s citizens are direct descendants of the original
settlers. Tourists interested in 19th century architecture may enjoy seeing quaint homes
and gardens against a xeric backdrop of contrasting geology, replete in mineral history.
In May, 1864, Francis
Lee1 and six other
families moved from
Santa Clara, Utah, to
Meadow Valley. There
they established
the
agricultural settlement,
Panaca, probably named
after a Paiute word for
“white
metal”.
The
community
struggled
from the first. Shortly
after their arrival, the
Meadow Valley
settlers erected a fort for protection against Indian raiding and theft.
In 1865, Clover
Valley (southeast) and Eagle Valley and Spring Valley (northeast) were also settled by
LDS pioneers. These budding communities found ready outlets for their produce and
dairy products in the burgeoning number of prospectors streaming through their valleys.
1
The writer’s wife and recently-elected County Sheriff, Kerry Lee, distant cousins, figure amongst Lee’s
numerous descendents.
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Particularly, nearby Pioche
benefited from this steady
supply of food and timber
the Mormons freighted-in.
Panaca
remains
a
compatible sister settlement
to the more infamous town
that sprang up around the
claims on the 'panacker
ledge.' This wild town
initially became known as
Pioche's City, after the
financier and investor (who
controlled its mining output
from distant San Francisco,
but) who never set foot in
the town that still bears his
name.
Because the County Seat
was,
prior
to
1871,
originally located at distant
Hiko, the usual problems
erupted revolving around the
proper filing of claims.
With more and more
prospectors drifting into the
area and staking claims,
sometimes these overlapped
prior claims. Mine owners
resorted to hiring guards, and gunslingers to protect their mining claims. For a time, guns
became the only law, and Pioche
made Dodge City, Bodie, and
Tombstone, pale in comparison
with its violence. It has been
claimed that at least seventy-five
men died "with their boots on"
before anyone in Pioche died of
natural causes.
The population has fluctuated over
the past century, with the surges and
downturns in mining, railroad
activity, and tourism. Today, the
entire population of Lincoln County is under 4,000 people, with its primary occupations
remaining within the sectors of agriculture and cattle ranching, railroad, small-scale
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mining, and government services (Federal, State, and County). Panaca has remained
more steady with its agrarian lifestyle. New building, currently, can be seen on many
heretofore undeveloped, lots—a reflection of the trek West that is still the trend. In its
own small way Window Peak Trace Minerals is contributing to the economy of Panaca
and to the nutritional health of believers in the product. To find out more about what
Panaca’s own variety of organically enhanced Montmorillonite can do for you, your
crops, livestock and pets, log onto www.montmorillonite.info.
For business opportunities with the following two customers of Window Peak Trace
Minerals, please log onto www.montmorillonite.biz
ANIMAL
TRACE-MINERALS
US Patent
TRADITIONAL USES INCLUDE:
• PROVIDES DIETARY Micro Nutrients
• TRAPS TOXINS
• IMPROVES SKIN AND HOOF CONDITION
• REDUCES STRESS
• DIGESTION IMPROVEMENT
• ENERGY INCREASE
• IMPROVES HYDRATION LEVELS
Manufactured for:
Trace Minerals Research Group, Inc.
Coral Gables, FL 33134
1-866-681-1880
www.animaltraceminerals.com
From US Patent #6,764,692
See also, www.organic-gardener.net .
Another interesting website which should help you to clear up a multitude of
misunderstandings about mineral clays compared to hard-rock minerals, and the
difference between chelated and un-chelated minerals, is: www.colloidaltraceminerals.net
There are a number of myths associated with mineral supplements and considerable misinformation exists within the nutritional industry.
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