Month: February 2022

Bayliss Library – Sault Ste. Marie – Michigan – Historical Display

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The display I created in the entrance case at Bayliss Library

For those of you that like the history that I post, must realize I have a sizable collection of Upper Peninsula historical items. Many of these are pictures that often are posted here, but I do have other items as well as some picture haven’t made it here yet.

2022 Great Michigan Read – The Women of Copper Country

Here’s a chance to check some of these items out. In conjunction with the Great Michigan Read – The Women of Copper Country, at Bayliss Library here in the Sault, I have displayed some Copper Country history in the glass case at the entrance of Bayliss Library.

Stereoview pictures of the Italian hall Disaster in Calumet, shipwreck and local scenes.

These will be on display throughout the month of February. If you are in the Sault, stop by the library and take a look.

The General Store in Eagle Harbor, Michigan

This is one of the only times I’ve put some of these in front of the public. For more information on Bayliss Library, go here: https://www.sdl.michlibrary.org/our-locations-and-hours/bayliss-public-library

Pictures of shipping copper during the copper boom.

Copper Country Early Engravings – 1860’s Keweenaw Copper Range Pictures

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This image is of miners washing the tailings from copper mining ore as it was brought out of the mine.

A while back I acquired an old magazine from 1860 that had a few drawings of the early days of mining in the Upper Peninsula. These were printed when the copper boom was rising giving us in this century, some of the earliest images of the beginning of this era of our history.

Mining in the early days was intensely dangerous, even more so than today. The rock was blasted with dynamite and the miners only had a single candle to see what they were doing. The guy holding the chisel has to have a lot of trust in his co-workers.

The danger of those days can’t be understated. There was poor lighting and high explosives were used on a regular basis. The threat of cave-ins and flooding were constant. Accidents abounded.

Getting ore out to where it could be shipped wasn’t easy. This shows Lake Linden in the distance as viewed from one of the mines. The entire track can be seen and it shows the extremes of getting the ore out. I’ve seen this as a photograph as well.

Getting the ore out of the Upper Peninsula wilderness was no easy task. The picture above shows not only that aspect, but the process of getting it to shipping. The track runs down the incline to a plant below. The copper ore was then smelted into large ingots (copper bricks) and then shipped south through the Great Lakes. Millions of tons were mined, smelted and then shipped during the copper boom, much of it like the picture above.

This is an early copper mine hoist. This is long before the immense steel hoists dominated the peninsula.

In the early days, wood was the only building material available to build the necessary structures for mining. It wasn’t until steel and equipment could be shipped into Lake Superior that the steel hoists came into prominence. This is just a small bit of our mining history.