Traveling means you go everywhere and try everything –for our readers.

Without a mine tour, we figured we weren’t experiencing Bisbee at its most memorable.  So, we joined a tour.  Advanced reservations are suggested as once the tour trolley is full, you must wait for another trip.  With five trips daily, there is lots of opportunity to have this experience.

Preparing for the experience

Once you’ve paid your money ($13 for adults, $5.5 ages 4-12), you receive a small, pin-on medallion.  When it’s time for your tour, you line up and get suited up.  Everyone – everyone the smallest child – receives a heavy yellow rain slicker and a lamp they wind around you so you don’t lose it.  (It’s best to leave large and heavy bags behind. Sturdy shoes would be a good idea.)  Once you’re suited up, you tramp outside and get on a trolley that you straddle.  It isn’t fancy, but probably it’s a lot nicer than what the miners had.

Suited up and ready to go below

Time to go below

The several-car trolley moves on its track to the opening of the mine, curving as it heads into the darkness.  It is cold and forbidding the moment you can no longer see daylight.  Miners, who worked 8-10 hour shifts, did not see a lot of daylight.  The extravagant amount the miners earned at most: $12.30 per shift (not hour!)

Our tour guide Steve kept us together and filled us in on what life was like for miners, how the metals were extracted and housekeeping issues.

Life in the Mines

Actually, in the Copper Queen area there were two mines, the open pit mine that was exposed for all to see, and the Copper Queen that includes 260 miles of tunnels.  Mine shafts are horizontally placed at 100-ft intervals.  Without lights, it is BLACK as night.  Early on, candles were the light source and, according to Steve, 5-7 candles were needed for each miner’s shift.  Two shifts were worked each day.  (In the mills and smelting, once the ore was extracted, three shifts tackled that effort.)

Trooping up stairs to a cavern area

The massive effort was responsible for over 8 billion lbs of copper being extracted from the mine.  By products included zinc, lead, and silver.

The miners did not use canaries to gauge air quality.  Rats and cockroaches would let them know if cave-ins or poor air quality was an issue.  Still, many miners developed silicosis, a disease that cause lung problems.  Steve, our tour guide, told us he worked in the mines, but not for long.  He went back to school, earned a degree in mining, and improved his status in life.  Being a tour guide, he now goes underground regularly.

In the early mining years, tools were more rudimentary.  Dynamite, which was produced in nearby Benson at the Apache Powder Company, was used to blow holes in the walls.  Timber was used to prop up areas and support the walls.

Steve show how the drills worked

Interestingly, miners had an elaborate procedure for placing the dynamite, which was only done at the end of a shift.  They had an intricate way they set up the dynamite at distances and amounts for the explosions and safety procedures in place.  Since it took 40 seconds for a blast to go off, they could judge when to get out of the way. If a blast did not go off, they notified the next shift so they could be alert for it.  Phones were in the mines for emergencies that were hooked to both the local hospital and the mine office, so quick action could be taken to save anyone injured.

An elaborate system of bells was also used to let others know where people were in their rudimentary elevators that traveled between shafts. Five bells meant they were ready to blast, an important warning.

A map showing the mine tunnel locations - and the way out

With their precautions, purportedly only 14 were killed in cave-ins.

Still, it was not a fun life.  “Bathrooms” were “two-seater honeypots,” chambers fastened to a wagon that could be hauled away and dumped.  Steve said he never saw two people on the honeypot at the same time.

To make a point about how dark the mine is without lights, Steve had everyone turn off the lights for a moment.  Not just dark, it was profoundly black, damp and scary.  We rapidly turned our battery-operated lights on again.

What did miners do if their lights went out and they wound up alone (miners did work in pairs)?  They moved along feeling for the tracks that carried the ore out, following its path until they could get out. Not a situation anyone would relish.

Sadder than the miners’ lives underground was that of the mules used to haul the ore.  They never came up from underground for years!  When they were finally brought to the surface, they were close to blind and had to be gradually acclimated to light again.

According to one Bisbee local, the miners trudged up the hills, after a long day in the mines, to their homes that had no running water and no electricity.

Out again

Back to daylight

When we finally came back to daylight again, it was liberating.  We had been 1,500 feet into the mine.  An interesting experience, we were glad that we were not miners.

Surrendering our slickers and lights back in the tour office, we were glad to be back above ground again.

A shop with geodes and other possible rock purchases is available, plus a min-museum showing some of the tools and history of the mines.

Every time we see a copper penny or pipes, we will remember how that copper came to be used for that purpose.  The miners, in essence, made modern life possible.

Later this week…shopping around Bisbee.

As you drive into Bisbee from the north, you enter through a tunnel, as if you are going back in time.  To an extent, you are.  The town is nestled into a hillside and the feel is of the 1950s – or before.Bisbee was an old mining town.  When the mines closed, the town became a refuge for hippies back in the 1960s.  The crafty – as in “artsy-craftsy” friends of the hippies showed up, so Bisbee became a unique craft center and, consequently, a Mecca for tourism.

Unique Bisbee - their own historic manhole cover

Bisbee has settled down a great deal since its heady miner days when there were 50 establishments serving liquor in town.  The population of 20,000 in 1910 is down to around 6,000, with the census showing a somewhat mature age skew.

Bisbee now

The old mine, the architecture, and the hillsides create an almost surreal environment.

One of the most noticeable things about Bisbee – The natives are friendly!  Actually, it seems that most people in Bisbee are transplants.  While there, we met a woman who moved in after the mines closed. She spoke about the town and how tourism is a major center of employment, as well as the county government, which is located in Bisbee.  It is clear that without the tourism, Bisbee would probably be a ghost town. As it is, Bisbee claims to be the home of many ghosts.  (More on that next week.)

For such a small population, we found people drawn to stay. Our waitress at Dot’s Diner (review coming up next week) came to Bisbee for a visit and has stayed for two years.

Louis, a gentleman from New York City, retired to Bisbee for its climate.  He also discovered a welcoming community where everyone was willing to include you and be friendly.  He was just returning from a trip to Germany and seemed right at home in another favorite regular’s hangout, The Bisbee Breakfast Club.

We found Bisbee friendly.  Wandering into the “fiber guild,” housed in the basement of the YWCA, a group of weavers regularly congregate from their membership of 80!  There had to be at least 20 looms in the large room.  Some of the inventive and recycled fabrics used in the weaving include old jeans, sheets, and other worn out materials.  There were also some really gorgeous knitted hats, gloves and other items for sale, but, since we live in Arizona, our need for those are minimal.

We stayed overnight at the Copper Queen Hotel, a stately old reminder of how hotels used to be.  Service was courteous – rather old-fashioned these days, too, in these times of diffident service – and the rooms were definitely evocative of the early 1900s when the hotel was built to serve the upscale mine management.

A day or two in Bisbee to take the underground Copper Queen Mine Tour and shop, shop, shop were fun diversions.  The very unusual thing about Bisbee – I don’t remember a single chain store in the entire town!  (Finding a gas station was a bit of a challenge until a friendly local told us where to find the Circle K – possibly the only chain in town.)

So, if you’re looking for a unique, old-fashioned experience, join us next week while we explore the food, the mines, the shops and the experience of Bisbee, Arizona.