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AZentertain: Arizona Gold Rush: Camp Bonito
Mining for gold at Campo Bonito in the Santa Catalinas
Download a
free sample of "Treasures of the Santa Catalina Mountains" and purchase the full print or Kindle version
on amazon.com. Read samples chapters from the book below.
By Robert Zucker
After the California Gold
Rush ended in 1859, many of the disillusioned, the well financed and the
adventurous migrated to Southern Arizona in search of gold. That
started the Arizona Gold Rush of the 1880s.
The Camp Bonito site was one
of the early mining districts formed in the Old Hat mining district,
just south of Oracle, Arizona in the Santa Catalina Mountains.
The persistent legends of a lost city and a lost Spanish mine became overshadowed by recent discoveries of gold deposits, and gold in quartz stones, that seem to drip from the mountains and flow from the Cañada del Oro, according to newspaper accounts during the late 1880s.
Local Prospector Flint
Carter at the Campo Bonito camp site. Carter has held dozens of mining
claims throughout the Oracle, Arizona and Santa Catalina areas. © 2011
BZB.
When gold mining in the
Santa Catalinas was in full swing in the 1890s, it attracted even more
people looking for a quick path to riches.
The town of Oracle, north of Tucson, Arizona was settled to prospect the hills north of the Catalinas.
Mining in the mountains became a big business.
Campo Bonito, also called Camp Bonito, was one of the biggest mining groups.
Campo Bonito is located in what is
known as the Control District, Old Hat District and Santa Catalina
District, south of Oracle. The San Pedro River flows along the east.
Tucson is on the south side of the Catalina Mountains.
The mineral list from the Campo Bonito mines included Calcite, Dolomite, Galena, Gold, Pyrite, Scheelite, Talc and Wulfenite. 1
The location of the "Buffalo Bill" claims
The Campo Bonito mining district is most well known for its connection to the famous Buffalo Bill Cody.
By 1912, several months after Arizona became a state, the Bisbee Daily Review published an overview of mining in the Catalinas.
Campo Bonito. To the north and west of Apache camp and at a lower altitude is the scene of the Cody-Dwyer M. & M.
company's operations. The company has thirty-six locations here and a
forty-ton mill has been installed. There is a scheelte gold ore that
yields to the milling and concentrating pro cess. The Southern Bell, owned by the Cody-Dwyer Interests, is now under bond to Capt Jack Burgess.
The property consists of nine
patented and four unpatented claims, a patented mill slto and a ten
stamp mill. Pepper Sauce Gulch is the location of the "Buffalo Bill"
claims, consistIng of twelve In number. The Coy-Dwyer and the
Cody-Burgess combinations own and control several groups In addition to
the foregoing that are receiving more or less practical attention.
The ore in tho vicinity of Campo Bonito is in places a disseminated sulphide carrying gold and sliver
values. Oxidizing agencies have freed the values to a considerable
extent from their base combinations, making amalgamation practicable to a
certain extent. Both Apache Camp and Campo Bonito are In tho "Old Hat"
district and are easily accessible to Tucson by excellent wagon road.
The E. P. and S. W. railway has surveyed to the former camp and the
course of line runs approximately near to all tho important mining
interests now known in that locality. Its construction is well within
the realms of the possible." 2
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Campo Bonito Index
Map to Campo Bonito, Arizona
Campo Bonito map
to locate topographic and geological points using Google's map. Zoom
into close range to see the tunnel to one of the major mines in Camp
Bonito. Print out copies in several formats and dimensions.
The mines of Buffalo Bill
The discovery of precious minerals near
Tucson attracted the famous Western entertainer William "Buffalo Bill"
Cody to Oracle in the early 1900s to invest in several mines in the Camp
Bonito District (also called Campo Bonito). Continue reading about Buffalo Bill and Campo Bonito.
Visiting the Campo Bonito mine
Photos taken at the Campo Bonito site, including one of the nearby mines.
The Southern Belle Mine
One of the mines owned by Cody, near Campo Bonito is the Southern Belle gold mine.
Old Hat Mining District
Mining was designated by districts. Campo Bonito was a part of the Old Hat mining district.
Return to Index: Arizona Gold Rush
A tub used for cleaning and separating ores sits idle at the Campo Bonito site. @ BZB 2011.
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Photo: The Camp Bonito remains of the
fireplace at the mess hall, near the old Cody-Dwyer mine south of Oracle
in the Catalina Mountains. Photo by Robert Zucker. © BZB 2010.
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Campo Bonito looking towards the San Pedro Valley in the Santa Catalina Mountains. © 2011 BZB
Links to Campo Bonito
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The entire Campo Bonito group of mining
claims spread through the entire valley to include the Apache Peak area
(Juniper claim, Memory Lane group, the Pair O' Dice prospect, Red Dog
claim, Southern Belle Mine (Southern Belle gp; Morning Star property/claims), and the Taraldson claim (Coronado NF Mla).
The Campo Bonito Mines also included the Maudina Mine claims/property, the High Jinks Mine and the Santa Rosa Mine (Cumaro claim). 3
Continue reading about Camp Bonito:
Footnotes and links to sources:
1. Mindat.org Database: Pure Gold Mine, Campo Bonito Mines, Apache Peak area. http://www.mindat.org/loc-130446.html
2. "Santa Catalinas and the Old Hat Mining Districts," Bisbee Daily Review, May 14, 1912, page 5m, image 5 http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84024827/1912-05-14/ed-1/seq-5/
3. Locality Search, http://www.mindat.org/lsearch.php?from=nsearch&loc=bonito
Robert Zucker, a Tucson, Arizona native, author, former journalism instructor and newspaper pubisher, is the CEO of Entertainment Magazine network, publisher of AZentertain.com. Zucker has researched and explored the Santa Catalina mountains.
William "Flint" Carter
is a local miner who has been prospecting the Santa Catalinas and
surrounding areas for decades. Carter has held dozens of mining claims
and has been in persuit of the lure of the legends.
Download a
free sample of "Treasures of the Santa Catalina Mountains" and purchase the full print or Kindle version
on amazon.com. Read samples chapters from the book below.
© 2011 AZentertain.com. All rights reserved. Entertainment Magazine network. BZB Publishing, Inc.
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Cody Stone is mined and designed as jewelry grade gold and silver in quartz from the mountains of the Santa Catalinas.
Cody stone specimens and hand made items
are on display at the Oracle Inn Steakhouse & Saloon in Oracle,
Arizona. Get a tour of the area, see artifacts of the Iron Door Mine and
Southwest, and mine for gold with Flint Carter. The only source for Cody Stone. Call Flint at 520-289-4566.
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Arizona on Amazon
Garmin GPS and Maps
 Locate
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Newspaper Archive
 Read
more about mining and Camp Bonito from The Newspaper ARCHIVE.com, the
largest historical newspaper database online. Its web site contains tens
of millions of newspaper pages from 1753 to the present. Every
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it easy for you to quickly explore historical content. Newspaper
ARCHIVE.com is constantly adding newspaper pages - with one newspaper
page added every second - that's over 80,000 images a day, or about 2.5
million pages per month! Find anything from any year back to 1759 in the World's Largest Newspaper Archive!
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