news A RETURN TO LEGACY The reopening of Central City’s Bates Hunter Mine
STORY AND PHOTOS BY SARAH HAAS
10 November 15, 2018
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t’s 8 a.m. at Central City’s newly reopened Bates Hunter Mine, the sun just peaking over the valley walls. It’s been over 70 years since gold was last mined here, but as the miner’s begin to arrive at work on a November day in 2018, it feels like they’ve been here all along, like this is where they’re supposed to be. By all appearances today is a normal day, although on the agenda is at least one extraordinary task; after months of removing water from the main shaft, the miners can finally access the 163-foot level, submerged and unseen since an exploratory visit in 2008. And, aside from a few maps that look like a simplistic version of Snakes and Ladders, the crew doesn’t really know what to expect on today’s seminal descent.
“We’re just gonna go down and check it out, gauge the condition of the The newly reopened Bates infrastructure, poke around Hunter Mine in on the landing,” says Matt Central City holds the history and Collins, the mine’s general future of manager and engineer. “It’ll Colorado’s Gold Rush within its be neat to see how close tunnels. these are to our maps.” In hopes of extracting ore by the end of the year, the miners have already been hard at work getting the site in working order: cleaning the shop, retrofitting the water treatment plant and dewatering the mine. For the most part, those tasks will continue to be the bulk of their daily work, but, even with today’s pioneering task added
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