When was butte montana founded

Spokane, Washington, the Use this link to get back to this page. Butte, Montana: Minerals, mines, and history. Authors: Robert E. Jenkins and Jerry A. Date: January-February From: The Mineralogical Record Vol.

Publisher: The Mineralogical, Inc. Document Type: Article. Length: 33, words. Translate Article. Set Interface Language. Decrease font size. The Anaconda Mining Company, to reduce the costs involved in the labor-intensive nature of underground mining, started to conduct open strip mining.

Thus, instead of tunneling down for the copper, entire hillsides were simply removed. The legacy of this is completely obvious today, too, in the form of the Berkeley Pit and other nearby strip mines some of which are still active strip mines today.

However, fewer and fewer people worked in the industry, leading to a steady loss of both businesses and people from Butte. Further adding injury to a loss of population, the environmental disaster that Butte was finally became noticed. The reason for the Superfund designation was because all the heavy metals lying around on the surface of the ground leached toxic metals into the nearby rivers and into the water table. Before action was taken to clean this up, it was common for the Clark Fork River which begins just to the west of Butte to literally run red during heavy rains.

ARCO then ceased all mining operations in Butte in although they still ended up paying for the Superfund Cleanup that followed. Strip mining operations resumed in when Montana Resources started active strip mining in adjacent areas near the Berkeley Pit. Custom Search. It was founded in as a local mining mecca. In fact, it was once the largest city west of the Mississippi between Chicago and San Francisco.

That's no accident. In , a fire burned down the entire central business district. Afterwards, the Butte city council passed a law that required all new buildings downtown to be built from brick or stone. The Pekin Noodle Parlor, which was founded by immigrants in , is the oldest Chinese restaurant in the country. The Berkeley Pit is a former open pit copper mine that is now extremely toxic. The museum is dedicated to preserving this part of Montana's history -- and you can even take an underground mine tour.