American Pioneer
& Cemetery Research
Project
Internet Presentation
Version 020209
By: Ed & Kathy
Block
APCRP Historians
Colorado
Mine is located in the Castle Dome Mountains NE of Yuma. It is reached by a rugged
4x4 trail that ends at Big Eye Mine. The track begins off a road that goes
to nearby Castle Dome Museum (well worth the visit!)
Take
good gravel road to east at Mile Post #55 off Arizona Hwy. 95 from Yuma to
Quartzsite. There is a sign for Castle Dome Museum at the turnoff and for
Castle Dome, Kofa National Wildlife Refuge, which
surrounds the mine.
Travel
eight miles to junction with Big Eye Mine Road (marked with
sign), then take right fork. Big Eye Mine is at end of this
road, a slow drive of 14.5 miles, has well preserved miner's cabin,
tunnel, etc, reached by short hike up a steep hill, worth visiting.
You
would need a 4 X 4 or good high clearance vehicle to reach Big Eye. When we
visited area in the fall of 2008, the road was badly washed out in places.
Colorado
Mine is 2.7 miles from the junction off the road to Castle Dome Museum, on Big
Eye Mine Road. There is not much known about this mine. Like most of
the mines at the southern end of the Castle Dome Mountains, silver and
gold were mined.
Map by: Neal Du Shane
The
district as a whole was very productive between 1863 and 1959. The mines
yielded about 9,500 to 10,000 ounces of placer and lode gold. We were
told by biologists counting big horn sheep in the area, who we met on the road
near Colorado Mine in the fall of, 2008, that the mine is still privately
owned, but we saw no signs at the site, where we'd camped for the night.
At
the Colorado Mine there are wooden-lined shafts and adits,
mainly on the left (north) side of the road. Across from the ruins and
the road, to the right (south) there is a row of four
graves marked with simple wooden crosses. (See photo below).
Colorado Mine Cemetery
Photo Courtesy: Ed and Kathy Block
We
recently wrote to Stephanie Armstrong, one of the owner/operators of the Castle
Dome Museum, asking about these graves. Here's her reply: "The
four graves at the Colorado Mine - a family died - we don't know why or who,
but it's said to be parents and two children. It's hard to say how old
the graves are since mining went on for so long out here. We would guess about
the turn of the century." (Thank you, Stephanie, for this
information!)
Photo Courtesy: Ed & Kathy Block
One
can only speculate that these people possibly lived and mined at the
Colorado Mine. To the left (north) of the graves and down into a little
valley near a small wash below the mine ruins, we found very old
stone foundations and walls and ruins of a stone corral. Could this have
possibly been their home?
Time seems to have
erased all records!
American Pioneer
& Cemetery Research
Project
Internet Presentation
Version 020209
WebMaster:
Neal Du Shane
Copyright © 2009 Neal Du Shane
All rights reserved. Information contained within this
website may be used
for personal family history purposes, but not for financial profit of any kind.
All contents of this website are willed to the American Pioneer & Cemetery
Research Project (APCRP).