Please remember to exercise caution when exploring Nevada's Ghost Towns & Mining Camps. Open shafts, drifts going into mountainsides, and old buildings, are all DANGEROUS. Be aware of your surroundings, and let someone know where you are, especially if your plans change.

 

Safford (Barth) (Pine Mountain) (Pine Valley)

DIRECTIONS: From Palisade, take poor road south for 4 miles to Safford.

"In August 1881, Ben C. Safford, a prospector, located a rich silver lode. Safford named his find the Onondaga Silver Mine and organized the Safford Mining District. Within a matter of weeks, a small rush to Safford developed. A townsite was laid out by H. N. Fletcher in September 1881. A small camp of about 20 soon formed and buildings were erected, including a schoolhouse. A post office opened on July 31, 1882, with Joseph Tyson as postmaster. He doubled as the town's assayer. Several businesses opened during 1882. Among the more prominent were the Pioneer Saloon (Jonathan Walker, proprietor), the Safford Restaurant (William Tregoning), and the Pratt Board and Lodging House (M. Pratt). An attorney, C. P. Hall, also hung his shingle in Safford. A stage line, from Gerald to Safford, was set up by Jack Petch and ran three times a week.

Although the post office closed on May 7, 1883, the camp of Safford was not declining-yet. Another rich mine, the Zenoli, was discovered by Gabriel Zenoli and Francisco Thoma. Literary enlightenment, the Safford Express, arrived on June 2,1883. The paper, however, was published in Palisade and delivered to Safford because the publisher, Lambert Molinelli, didn't feel that Safford would really last that long. Eventually, his hunch proved correct. Molinelli left the paper in July 1883, and was replaced by W. W. Booth, who had run papers throughout Nevada. The paper, however, lasted only until the end of August before it folded.

Mining continued, with a considerable amount of ore still being removed. An $8,000 shipment of ore was extracted in just one week during 1882. Ben Safford sold his holdings in June 1883 to A. E. Davis, T. H. Kramn, A. Halsey, William Sharp, and L. E. Kelley. These men organized the Onondaga Gold and Silver Mining Company, but the mines ran dry late in the same year, and Safford was soon abandoned. Only one person remained: Ben Safford. He believed that he would be able to discover a new ore deposit that would bring everyone back to his town. But he died in Safford without ever finding the elusive deposit. The district remained deserted until 1903, when the American Smelting and Refining Company opened the West Iron Mine (a.k.a. Barth Mine) at the mouth of Safford Canyon. During the next fifteen years, the company produced just under $2 million in iron ore. The Zenoli Mine was reopened in 1907 by the Zenoli Silver Copper Company, which produced $67,000 during the next two years. In 1915 the Safford Copper Company, with James Kimball as president, was incorporated and began to mine its Evening Star claim. A test shipment of ore was sent to Garfield, Utah, in 1917, but the ore values were poor and the company soon gave up. After 1918 the Safford Mining District was abandoned for good. The only mining activity in the area took place a few miles north of the townsite. The Nevada Barth Mining Company ran an extensive iron ore mine beginning in 1954. Not much is left in the lonely town of Safford today. Only rubble, mine dumps, and scattered debris remain to recall Ben Safford's dream."

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