The Kennedy and Argonaut Mine are in Jackson California perhaps its the biggest historic site in the entire area that is what drew my interest to it. Today it has been reopened as a tourist attraction. The mine was named for Andrew Kennedy who was an Irish Immigrant who discovered some quartz in an outcropping in the late 1850s near highway 49. Andrew was said to start mining just further up the road at the Oneida mine with just a bucket and wench in the 1850s. This operation allowed him to file a mining claim for the Kennedy Mine Tract. 

The Argonaut Mine however is a little older and was discovered in 1850 by James Hager and William Tudor. That mines development did not get very active till 1893 when the Argonaut Mining Company begin its operation here. The shaft in the Argonaut was 63 degrees and almost was as deep as the Kennedy with a depth of 5,570 feet! This mine produced around $25 Million in gold. Since they were both very close to one another I devoted this page to these historic mines. 

You can see below the overlook photos which I took right from the highway near where Andrew Made his discovery.  It was known as one of the deepest mines in the entire world and it closed in 1942. I guess the two things that caught my eye about this location is that its one of the deepest mines in the world but also the site where over 40 men died a horrible death. Of course the Kennedy and Argonaut were connected by tunnels thus making it one big mining operation. When the fire broke out within the mine they tried to retrieve the miners from various tunnels. Those bodies were not recovered for weeks!

After the discovery of the vein the Kennedy Mining Company formed in 1860 when Andrew and his three partners began digging shafts near the property entrance. The mine was in operation off and on such as in 1878 then in 1886 reopened after people invested almost 100,000 dollars to reopen it as a corporate entity of the Kennedy Mining and Milling Company.  During the time alot of Immigrants worked in the mine cause it was cheaper to pay them to keep the mine running.

In 1898 the company opened a new shaft almost 2000 feet deep near one of the original shafts. This same shaft eventually reached 5,912 feet deep which became the deepest mine in all of North America at the time. In 1928 a surface fire burned all the structures except two and 47 men were killed around 3000 feet below the surface you can read their names at this link: http://www.ohenrymace.com/the47.html 

After the fire all the other buildings and foundations were built after 1928 which you can see many of them today if you were to tour the area. The mine then stayed up till 1942 and was closed by our government due to World War II.  Back then gold was not worth as much as it is today but none the less it produced $34.3 Million dollars when it was worth $20.67 to $35.00 an ounce. The company paid the stock holders $5.8 Million dollars between 1886 and 1937 which were paid at $20.67 per ounce if you wish to work it out. So it definitely was a very rich mine and of course if you were to continue to dig in the shafts guarantee you would find more gold. 

The Argonaut mine was right nearby and supposedly the two shafts connected to each other thus making both mines a part of eachother. An interesting fact about the area is that when it was shut down their were over 50 miles of tunnels surrounding this site. That truly is amazing and today some of them tunnels lay deep underground untouched by man for many years.

In 1961 a ceramics teacher bought the 151 acres and lived on the property for many years named Sybil Arata for almost $42,000 a pretty good steal if you ask me considering the land, miners office and other structures came with the purchase. She died in 1994 and had two wishes that the area remained as a wildlife habitat and that the mine could be cherished for its history. In 1996 the Kennedy Mine Foundation was formed to preserve this jewel. 

The tailing wheels helped haul the debris away from the mine and today 3 of the 4 remain as you see in the various photos. 

Below is some genealogy information on the burials of the miners who perished at Kennedy. Yes we visited the cemeteries but I did not take enough photos to really add it to the site. But I did visit the miners graves so as you can see I did alot of extensive work with the area. It was the worst mining disaster in California.  I am posting this considering the cemeteries border the Kennedy Property as well. Its an interesting area!

JACKSON – A fire at the Argonaut Gold Mine here on August 27, 1922 killed 47 miners. It was the worst mine disaster in California history. Eleven of the miners are buried in the Saint Sava Serbian Orthodox Church Cemetery. Others are buried in the Jackson City Cemetery, east of Church Street and off Cemetery Lane, northeast of downtown Jackson.       GO THERE

The Kennedy Mine, famous for being one of the deepest gold mines in the world is located here.
The Native Daughters of the Golden West was founded here in Jackson in 1886.
Buried here in the Jackson City Cemetery are:
– Victims of the 1922 Argonaut Gold Mine disaster.
– Mike Tovey (1842-1893) Distinguished Wells Fargo shotgun messenger and rider. Was shot and killed by a robber who attempted to hold up the stage on which he was traveling as guard.
– James T. Farley (1826-1886) Gifted orator and politician. State Assemblyman, State Senator 1869-1865, U.S. Senator 1878.
– Anthony Caminette (1854-1923) State Senator 1880s, U.S. Senator 1890s. Introduced the bill making California's Admission Day, Sept. 9th, a state holiday. Secured for Amador County the Preston School on Industry in Ione.
– Hiram Craig Meek (1788-1881) Native of Virginia. Major in the War of 1812. Thought to be the only man buried in California who personally knew George Washington.
– (Directions: From the Catholic Church - continue around on Church St. to entrance on left).
Buried here in the Jackson Catholic Cemetery are:
–Marie Suize or Swize (1824-1892) Also known as "Madam Pantaloons". French immigrant arrested in Jackson and Virginia City, Nevada for wearing men's clothing. Owned Amador's most successful winery near Clinton. .
– Angelo Noce (1847-1922) Sought recognition of Christopher Columbus for discovery of America, and was founder of Columbus Day as a legal holiday in the U.S.
–Andrew Kennedy (1803-1871) Discoverer of the Kennedy Mine, at one time the deepest gold mine in the world.

If you want to get into the disaster more in 1922 the fire was raging inside the mines which meant that the men suffocated and burned alive. Not very many miners were saved when this happened. I guess that the old tunnels were reopened to try to rescue the miners and it still failed.  Rumor has it by the locals that these miners still haunt the property its a rather sad story.

From Wikipedia
The Disaster

On August 27, 1922, forty-seven miners, mostly immigrants from Italy, Spain, and Serbia, were trapped in a fire 4,650 feet (1,409 m) below ground. Other miners who had been near the surface poured water down the shaft in an attempt to put out the flames. By dawn, townspeople and other miners arrived to help, but it took two-and-a-half days for the fire to be extinguished.

Rescuers began re-opening tunnels from the Kennedy Mine which had been closed since an earlier fire in 1919. It was slow going, but hopes remained high until September 18, when a canary inserted beyond a bulkhead by oxygen-tank-equipped workers died. Still, it took them three weeks to finally get to where the miners were trapped by the fire. None survived, and evidence indicated that they had all died within hours of the fire's breaking out. One of the bodies was not recovered until a year later. Most likely, water flushed down the shaft carried his body further into the mine, but in the intervening time, newspapers speculated he had fled the mine to start a new life.

It was determined that the mine had violated safety regulations, but the owners escaped punishment, as the United States Bureau of Mines had little enforcement power. The cause of the fire was never determined and put down to "incendiarism," a broad term meaning either arson or defective wiring.

The mine disaster is detailed in the book 47 Down: The 1922 Argonaut Gold Mine Disaster by O. Henry Mace (John Wiley & Sons, 2004, ISBN 0-471-44692-0).

Links

Kennedy Gold Mine Brochure (1.6MB PDF)
A Short History of the Kennedy Gold Mine (11.6K PDF)
Geology of the Kennedy Mine (9K PDF)
Kennedy Mine Gold Production (8.9K PDF)
Kennedy Mine Self-Guided Tour (714K PDF)
Sponsor the Kennedy Mine (401K PDF)
Kennedy Mine: Local Restaurants and Accommodations (19K PDF)
These files require Adobe® Reader® (20.8 MB)

One can let their imagine run wild in a location like this with the reservoirs nearby, hidden foundations in the woods, old buildings, ghost stories, tailing wheels, and walking on the land where deep tunnels reside just under ones feet. Its an amazing area and we will eventually work with it more another time another place.  You have to understand the tragedy of a miner. He spent a part of his life in darkness....breathing in dirty air and dust. He was not paid very much and did most of the leg work. For a miner to go to work each day meant living on the brink of death and when the accident occurred here those men never seen daylight again thus making this a horror story in itself. Today those tunnels are still more then likely haunted by the ghost of its past!

© By

Rick-AngelOfThyNight

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