Scrubbed by flood, named for gold, encouraged vanadium

 

Rio Grande Southern Rail Depot circa 1905, or 1910, Denver Public Library Special Collections. Men pose on the dock of the Rio Grande Southern Depot in Placerville, San Miguel County, Colorado. They wear duster and top hats, vests, and gold chains. The finial topped stationmaster's bay is behind them, with sign: "Placerville."

Placerville once produced 30 percent of the world's vanadium

 By Rob Carrigan, robcarrigan1@gmail.com

It was gold that originally led to the founding of Placerville, and it was named for the placer mines in the vicinity. In 1909, the town was almost completely washed away by flood. The original site was abandoned and a new depot and business section was built about a half mile upstream on the San Miguel River. The settlement first carried the handle "Dry Diggings," and then "Hangtown."

A family poses on their porch with their dog, Placerville, San Miguel County, Colorado, in 1908. Denver Public Library Special Collections.

Placerville was originally established as a small mining camp,  named after the placer gold mines located on the San Miguel River and Leopard Creek. The location became known as Old Placerville after the Rio Grande Southern Railroad constructed a depot and several passing sidings west of the original settlement, calling it Placerville.

 A man stands on the railroad tracks near a vanadium plant in Placerville (San Miguel County), Colorado. He wears a felt hat, suit, and a cigarette dangles from his mouth. A team of horses pulls a wagon up a dirt road toward the plant. Dark smoke rises from the smokestacks. (About 1920, History Colorado photo)

A. B. Frenzel discovered vanadium-bearing sandstone near Placerville in the late 1890s. The ore was in strataform bodies in the Entrada Sandstone (Jurassic) east of the town. The principal mineral was roscoelite, with minor montroseite and carnotite. By the fall of 1899, development was described as "of the most superficial character," although Frenzel had driven one tunnel 18 feet into the rock. By 1901-1902, Frenzel was excavating several thousand tons intended for shipment to Europe. Most of the Placerville ore was less than 3% vanadium, too low grade to pay for shipment to Europe, so in 1905 the Vanadium Alloys Co. built an ore-processing mill southeast of Placerville to recover the metal as ferro-vanadium, which it sold. At least five mines were active at one time, and by 1919 the two ore mills at Placerville were producing 30% of the world's vanadium. Through 1940, the mines produced about 3.7 million pounds of vanadium.

 

Men pose on columned porches of frame saloons in Placerville, San Miguel County, Colorado. They wear vests, suspenders, aprons, hats, and bib overalls. A dog and horse are to one side. Saloons and hotel burned 1919. Denver Public Library Special Collections photo created from W. C. Welbon, Placerville, Colo.

According to Colorado Encylopedia, Vanadium had been identified in Colorado in 1898, when an ore called carnotite in the Paradox Valley was found to hold vanadium, radium, and uranium. Vanadium saw limited production in the early twentieth century, but as with tungsten and molybdenum, demand skyrocketed during World War I. By the early 1920s, Colorado had shipped some 500 tons of the stuff. Production declined after the war. During the Great Depression, when the development cost was low, the United States Vanadium Corporation bought up vanadium-producing properties, revived old mills, and established new towns at Uravan and Vancorum. Production remained limited, but the infrastructure proved helpful when demand for vanadium ramped up again ahead of World War II.

Among the carnotite metals identified at the turn of the century, radium was the most immediately useful; it provided nighttime illumination and was valued for experimental cancer treatments. Western Colorado soon became the world’s leading producer of radium, and in the 1910s, the National Radium Institute built a concentrator near Naturita and a plant in Denver. During World War I, prices for radium soared when supply from Austria was cut off in Allied countries. At the same time, demand increased as militaries scrambled for radium to light up instrumentation at night. Radium briefly became the most expensive substance in the world, going for more than $3 million per ounce. Yet Colorado’s radium industry quickly died out after World War I, when demand dropped and new deposits were discovered in the Belgian Congo, says Colorado Encyclopedia.

Although carnotite was recognized as a minor constituent of the ore since its discovery, the amount was small, and no assays were made of the uranium content of the ore until World War II. Beginning about 1950, the small uranium content of the ore was also recovered from the ore.

The Placerville Schoolhouse, a one-room schoolhouse, which operated from 1908 to 1960. Today, it has been restored and operates as a sort of community center for the 300 plus residents in the area, according to to San Miguel County information.

 

The tracks of the Rio Grande Southern Railroad are washed out after the Trout Lake Dam break of 1909 in San Miguel County, Colorado. Shows the San Miguel River and utility poles. Joseph E. Byers, Sept. 5, 1909. Denver Public Library Special Collections.

In 1909, the failure of the Trout Lake Dam caused the flooding of Placerville as well as Sawpit and Newmire, according to the Daily Journal (Telluride), Sept. 6, 1909. 

"Placerville. Sawpit and Newmire well nigh destroyed. Large number of livestock drowned by the flood. Railroads will be tied up not less than three weeks. Great amount of inconvenience will necessarily follow,"  the paper reported..