Starbuck's Exploring

Sign in Subscribe

Mining

Mines

246 posts

Empire Mine State Historic Park

Empire Mine State Historic Park

Back in 2003, we took a trip up to the Sierra Nevada, and our group gained special permission from the California State Park service to explore a small underground portion of the massive Empire Mine inside the appropriately named Empire Mine State Historic Park in beautiful Grass Valley, California. Doug

Piute Stamp Mill

Piute Stamp Mill

With a tip from our friends at Explore Historic California, we found a small three-stamp mill in the southern Sierra Nevada mountains. Not much is left, but it is an interesting little find. I haven’t found any history on it, and I only got a few photos. No directions

Western Mine

Western Mine

In 2003, I met up with a couple of friends at this great old cinnabar mine. It was worked for a long time and is an exciting place. We had a great day exploring the ruins and some underground tunnels. This cinnabar mine once had a tram, roasting furnace. No

Palmer Mine

Palmer Mine

This is quite a place! This is a massive and strange mine. The sound of underground rivers far below, 4-foot boreholes going hundreds of feet through the mountain into the unknown, elevators, hoists, slushers, rusty ladders, pipes, stalactites, underground offices, workrooms, explosive lockers, and strange experimental testing equipment, all spread

Noonday Mine

Noonday Mine

We have visited this mine many times over the years. It is one of the earlier mines in the War Eagle Mine group. It was successful enough that the owners built a tramway down the hillside and developed their own railroad to connect to the mainline Tidewater and Tonopah railroad.

Santa Rosa Mine

Santa Rosa Mine

These dusty old photos are from a combination of trips to the old Santa Rosa Mine in the Inyo Mountains. Not much is left of this place, but it was nice to see the ore cars. And one of them was still sitting on the rails. A rich lead-silver mine,

Mystery Stamp Mill

Mystery Stamp Mill

This forgotten stamp mill site was a great find. The mining district was formed in the 1880s, and this was a significant mine of the district. Early work on this gold and silver mine started in 1882 or 1883 and continued up until about 1925. There is an interesting contradiction