Re: SPNG ROW & Unknown wreck site

Yes, copper was mined along the C&C. I am not sure of where all it was mined, but here is what I'm aware of.

The Dayton newspaper from the early 1880s reported copper ore being received at the Dayton Mill (later Joe Douglas Mill). Occasionally it noted that copper was being sent to a smelter or mill in Reno. The mill at Sodaville was initially reported to have been for copper.

Over the years there were a number of copper claims and prospects in the Lunning area. I have seen reports of copper mining in the hills west of Lunning and Mina. A woman Hispanic prospector and claim owner living in Lunning was known as "the Copper Queen" (See the book A Mine of Her Own: Women Prospectors in the American West, 1850-1950, by Sally Zanjani and published by University of Nebraska.

Mines of Churchill and Mineral Counties published in 1988 reprinted 1936 and 1938 informational circulars on the mines and mining in those counties. The author provides Mineral County production figures for 1910 to 1934; copper is listed for each of these years with the the highest copper production in Mineral County occurring during 1912-15.

Brian Norden