blackfoot-valley

Note: Mining in the late 1800s and early 1900s was a tough, dangerous job with few regu- lations to protect the miners. In 1917, the Butte, Montana copper mines were operating at full wartime capacity. On June 8,1917, in the Granite Mountain mine disaster, an electric cable was being lowered into the mine as part of a fire safety system. When the cable fell and was damaged, a foreman (2,500 feet below the surface) with a carbide lamp went to inspect the damage, and the oil-soaked cloth insulation on the cable caught fire from his lamp. The fire quickly climbed the cable, and turned the shaft into a chimney, igniting the timbers in the shaft. In the ensuing blaze 168 miners died, most from asphyxia. A few min- ers barricaded themselves in the bulkheads and were found 55 hours later. A strike ensued as a result of the catastrophe, which remains the deadliest underground mining disaster in U.S. history. “Copper Miners, Speculator Mine, Butte Montana” 1916 courtesy Wikimedia 105