gold mine dredge skeleton creek book talk

It’s a relief for many who feared that the confidential negotiations among the state, the E.P.A. The plan also calls for cleaning up hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of buried mine waste along the creek’s route. The recently announced plan calls for the portion of Silver Bow that flows through Slag Canyon - whose walls are made of mine waste - to be rerouted into a new channel away from the waste’s toxic soils. “If someone had told me 20 years ago I’d be catching trout here, I’d have taken that bet,” said Matt Vincent, a former local government executive and now a consultant who has been working on the cleanup for two decades, as he stood on the bank. Hiking trails and picnic tables invite visitors. On a recent gray spring morning, mallards paddled around in the reclaimed section of stream and small fish, darting like shadows, could be seen. Nonetheless, Butte loves its reclaimed Silver Bow. “Since I can remember, people have always said, ‘Don’t go near Silver Bow Creek,’” said Ellen Crain, director of the Butte Silver Bow Public Archives, which chronicles the mining history here. Along the banks of the Silver Bow, cattle bones turned an almost neon blue-green from high levels of copper in the water. Most life in the stream and along its banks was wiped out. A massive flood in 1908 washed tons of waste along the length of the creek.

Mine waste was dumped into it from smoke-belching factories that concentrated ore, and the creek was rerouted and tapped to satisfy industrial demands. Over the years, the stream was polluted beyond recognition. After thousands of miles of tunnels were dynamited and drilled, a giant open pit copper mine was dug near the headwaters of the creek. The discovery turned into a full-blown gold rush and in the 1860s, swarms of miners tore at the tiny stream for its riches.īutte, though, was birthed from the “copper womb,” as one poet wrote, a far richer lode. The first flecks of gold found here in 1864 were along a creek whose meanders, sparkling in the sun, earned it the name Silver Bow.

Gold mine dredge skeleton creek book talk