Bingham Consolidated Smelter

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Bingham Consolidated Smelter (1899-1907)

When it opened in 1899, Bingham Consolidated's smelter was the second copper smelter in the Salt Lake City area. Its fires "will be extinguished within the next few hours." The Utah Consolidated's Highland Boy smelter had been the first copper smelter (opened in 1899), and the United States smelter was the third. Judge Marshall's decree was to take effect on January 6, 1908, shutting down all smelters in Salt Lake Valley due to sulfur and arsenic emissions causing damage to farmers' crops. (Deseret News, December 24, 1907)

The historical site of the Bingham Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company smelter (constructed starting in October 1899 by its predecessor, the Bingham Copper & Gold Mining Co., and closed in late 1907 due to federal smoke nuisance injunctions) is located on the north end of Midvale, Utah (historically known as Bingham Junction).

The smelter tract was situated on the east side of the Jordan River, directly adjacent to the historic Rio Grande Western (RGW) railroad mainline. It sat immediately north of the United States Smelting, Refining, and Mining Company's sprawling site.

Today, the modern geographic location corresponds to about 7400 South and 700 West.

The Sanborn Fire Insurance map for Midvale in 1911, updated in 1930 and 1940, shows the site immediately west of Midvale's Main Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues. The original 1911 index map shows the site as the Bingham Copper & Gold Mining company, and later updates show the site as Western Non-Metallic Production company. The sheets themselves show the site as first, Western Steel & Foundry company, then as Western Non-Metallic Production company. The structures on the site lay in a general east-west orientation, with portions of the USSR&M smelter immediately to the south. It appears that the railroad service was provided by OSL(UP) rather than D&RGW.

Aerial photos from 1937 show the buildings still in place, immediately north of the USSR&M smelter, and likely confused by many to be part of the USSR&M, which by this time, may have purchased the site and re-purposed the building for its own use. The Bingham Consolidated's slag dump lay to the north of the smelter. The USSR&M slag dump lay directly the the west.

Key points of the Bingham Consolidated smelter site:

Operated from 1901 to 1907 as a copper smelter (expanded in 1902 to treat lead and silver-lead ores) to process high-grade sulfide ores shipped from Bingham Canyon mines like the Commercial, Dalton, and Lark.
Following the 1907 environmental shutdown, the site's large overhead cranes and direct rail connections were utilized by the Utah Consolidated Stone Company. Granite hauled by rail from the Little Cottonwood Canyon quarries was brought here for preliminary rough-cutting and staging before being sent to finish the construction of the Utah State Capitol, the University of Utah's Park Building, and the LDS Church Administration Building.
The site was re-purposed as one of Utah's earliest steel plants, operated by the Utah Steel Corporation (or Utah Iron & Steel Corporation), which reprocessed scrap and iron ore before the company eventually relocated its operations south to Ironton.

Timeline

December 1898
The Bingham Copper and Gold Mining Company was organized in December 1898 as a reorganization of the Bingham Gold Mining Company, to exploit the copper content of the ore being found in its Commercial mine. A copper smelter was constructed to treat copper sulphide ore, being put into operation on January 1, 1901. (Economic Geology of the Bingham Mining District, USGS Professional Paper No. 38, 1905, page 254)

October 1899
Bingham Copper & Gold Mining Company started construction on its Midvale smelter in October 1899. ("Economic Geology of the Bingham Mining District, Utah", USGS Professional Paper 38, 1905, p. 254)

April 1, 1900
"The Bingham Copper & Gold Mining company's smelter will be located at Bingham Junction, on the east side of the Jordan river and north of the Old Jordan & Galena site, owned by the United States company." (Salt Lake Herald, April 1, 1900)

April 24, 1901
The Bingham Copper and Gold Mining Company was reorganized as the Bingham Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company. The expansion included the purchase of the Dalton & Lark mining properties. (Engineering and Mining Journal, May 4, 1901, p. 572; "Economic Geology of the Bingham Mining District, Utah", USGS Professional Paper 38, 1905, p. 99)

January 15, 1901
Construction of the Bingham Copper and Gold company smelter, started in 1899, was completed with test runs beginning on January 15th. Full production began on January 31st. The new Copper Belt subsidiary railroad was not yet complete, so the mining company was shipping ore from the mine to the smelter in what was called "a steady stream of wagons". To get the smelter into full production, in addition to their own ore, the mining company used custom ores from the Grand Central and the Tesora mines in Tintic, along with reprocessing the slag dumps from the old smelters at Stockton. Pending completion of the company's Copper Belt rail line, the mine began shipping its sulfide copper ore to the smelter by wagon and team. ("Economic Geology of the Bingham Mining District, Utah", USGS Professional Paper 38, 1905, p. 254)

(The new smelter was adjacent to the Rio Grande Western mainline at Midvale.)

May 1902
In May 1902, the Bingham Consolidated smelter was expanded to allow the production of lead. (Hansen, p. 273)

November 1902
In his History of Bingham Mining District, Thomas Billings wrote:

The Bingham Copper and Gold Company was organized in December 1898 to work the carbonate and oxidized ores of the Commercial Mine which under the ownership of the Bingham Gold Mining Company was exploited for oxidized gold ore and treated by the cyanide process without success. Under the new ownership extensive exploration at depth was carried on and the results led to the construction of a semi-pyritic smelter in 1901 at Bingham Junction, now Midvale, Utah. This smelter went into commission in November 1902, originally built with a capacity of 1,000 tons for treating copper ore and in 1905 a plant of 400 tons capacity for treating silver-lead ores was added on a tract of land adjoining on the north the United States Company smelter. The Brooklyn and Dalton Lark properties acquired by this company in 1901 were unwatered by the driving of the Mascotte tunnel and shipments from these holdings commenced in 1903. These with increased productions from the Commercial mine and contracts for the treatment of the Boston Consolidated Stewart mine production and the copper concentrates from the Utah Copper porphyry operation necessitated additional furnaces and converters. Also, with the development of silver-lead ores in the Dalton Lark group, a lead furnace was added.

1903
Bingham Consolidated began shipping copper sulfide ores from its former Brooklyn property. (Economic Geology of the Bingham Mining District, USGS Professional Paper No. 38, 1905, page 381)

December 16, 1905
The combined properties of the Bingham Consolidated company were producing from 200 to 300 tons of copper ore daily during 1905 year, the product being shipped to the company's smelter, located on the Rio Grande Western railway at West Jordan, Utah, via a branch line from Revere station on that company's branch to Bingham. From 50 to 100 tons of lead ore is also produced daily which is shipped to the smelter of the American Smelting & Relining company at Murray, Utah. (Deseret Evening News, December 16, 1905)

December 24, 1907
Bingham Consolidated closed its Salt Lake valley smelter.

(Additional information about the Salt Lake valley smelter smoke case can be found in Michael Church's excellent article "Smoke Farming: Smelting and Agricultural Reform in Utah, 1900-1945" in Utah Historical Quarterly, Volume 72, Number 3, Summer 2004)

(Although there was very little coverage in the local newspapers, the smelter smoke suit likely included a financial settlement for the farmers from the smelting companies. This sudden financial drain was likely the cause of the failure of Bingham Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company in late 1907. Or, maybe the company declared bankruptcy to avoid having to pay any such settlement. More research is needed.)

April 7, 1908
With the copper smelter closed, the Bingham Consolidated Mining and Smelting Company was reorganized as the Bingham Mines Company on April 7, 1908 in Maine. Due to the closure of the smelter at Midvale, the company's ore was shipped to the Yampa smelter in Bingham, until that smelter closed in 1909. The ores were then divided, with the silver-lead ore going to the Asarco smelter at Murray, and the copper ore going to the Asarco smelter at Garfield. (The Copper Handbook, Volume 11, 1914, page 118)

After The Smelter (1911-1917)

March 13, 1911
"Will Dismantle Smelter. - Orders have been received from the Boston headquarters by General Manager Imer Pett of the Bingham Mines company to dismantle the Bingham Consolidated smelter at Midvale at once. This plant was closed down Dec. 26, 1907, when the court decided that the fumes from the stack were injurious to animal and vegetable life. The capacity of the plant ranged from 1,000 to 1,500 tons daily and is still in good condition. The component parts will be disposed of to the best advantage and thus will end an investment of about $1,000,000. A final clean-up will be made around the furnaces and other places where metal would be liable to accumulate." (Deseret News, March 13, 1911)

March 24, 1911
"Bingham Consolidated Smelter Being Razed. - The work of tearing down the Bingham Consolidated smelter at Midvale has begun, a force of twelve men being engaged on the job. The plant will be disposed of in the best market procurable." (Salt Lake Tribune, March 24, 1911)

Granite Finishing (1913-1917)

1913-1917
Granite blocks for the LDS Salt Lake City temple were shipped by railroad from the quarries at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon, by way of the Salt Lake & Alta railroad, to Midvale, where the preliminary rough work was completed; then by Union Pacific's Oregon Short Line to the finishing shops in Salt Lake City.

One of the finishing shops was on the site of the closed Bingham Consolidated Mining & Smelting company's copper smelter in Midvale. The smelter had closed in 1907 as a result of the smelter smoke law suits, after which the mining company, reorganized as the Bingham Mines company, sent its ore to the new Asarco smelter at Garfield.

The former smelter site of the Bingham Consolidated company remained in place, and was used in 1913 to 1917 to furnish the stone for the new state capitol building. The Utah Consolidated Stone company purchased the 25-acre former smelter site. The property was held for some time by the metal salvage firm N. Rosenblatt & Sons Company. The property still contained cranes, hoists, boilers, engines, and other machinery, and was to be manned by a force of 150 stone cutters to produce 500 cubic feet of cut and dressed stone for the capitol building per day.

Utah Steel Mill (1916-1922)

After the granite stone finishing companies ended their work using the former Bingham Consolidated smelter site for their work, the Rosenblatts began using the site for their Utah Steel company.

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