Simon Bamberger

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Simon Bamberger Biographical Notes

Simon Bamberger, fourth governor of the State of Utah, was born at Darmstadt, Bayern, Germany, February 27, 1847. In 1861, at the age of fourteen years he came to the United States, and in 1869 he became a resident of Utah. He assisted in developing the coal mining interests of Utah and in course of time was made president of the Bamberger Coal Company. His business interests were not confined to mining operations, however, as he has held the positions of director of the Salt Lake Valley Loan and Trust Company and director and treasurer of the Bamberger Electric Railway. In 1898 Mr. Bamberger was elected a member of the board of education of Salt Lake City and continued in that body for five years. He was elected state senator on the democratic ticket in 1902 and served for four years. During that time he increased his acquaintance over the state and became recognized as one of the leaders of the democratic party. In 1916 he was nominated and elected governor for a term of four years. He was Utah's first Democratic governor, first non-Mormon governor, and the oldest, assuming the office at age 71. (part from Utah Since Statehood: Historical and Biographical. Volume I.)

Shortly after coming to Utah in about 1869-1870, he settled in Ogden. Beginning in June 1870, Bamberger (with partners) ran the Whitehouse Hotel in Ogden. He remained in Ogden for just a short time, until December 1870 when he moved to Salt Lake City to take over management of the White House Hotel, formerly the Delmonico Hotel. In 1872, Bamberger invested in a silver mine, the Centennial Eureka Mine in Eureka in Juab County. A major vein of silver was struck two years later, making Bamberger a millionaire.

In 1875 he was hired to manage the operations of the San Pete Coal and Coke Company, and its subsidiary San Pete Valley Railway. The coal mine was near Wales in Sanpete County, and the railroad transported coal from the mine to a connection with the Utah Southern Railroad as that road built its line south, reaching Nephi in 1879.

He married Ida Maas in 1881 in Cincinnati, and they had four children, born between 1883 and 1889: Sidney, Helen, Elsa, and Julian.

In 1882 he organized a connecting railroad, the California Short Line Railroad, a small company with grand ambitions. The CSL only built about three miles of track, all within San Pete Valley. Both the railroad and the coal mine fell on hard times by 1888.

(The name meant that the railroad was to be the railroad line with the shortest distance, the "short line," to California. This was in 1882, less than a year after Union Pacific had organized its own Oregon Short Line Railway, as the "short line" to connect its mainline in southwestern Wyoming, with Oregon and the Pacific Northwest.)

In April 1888 the London owners of San Pete Coal and Coke Company, and its subsidiary San Pete Valley Railway, replaced Bamberger as general manager of the two companies.

Railroads

In 1890, he organized the Great Salt Lake & Hot Springs Railway to build an excursion line to Becks Hot Springs in northwest Salt Lake City.

In 1890, Simon Bamberger was shown as living at 126 S. Main, Salt Lake City, working for Rio Grande Western Railway, and was the proprietor of the Bamberger Quarry Company. (Utah Directory, 1890: Salt Lake City, Logan, and Provo, R. L. Polk and Company, 1890)

Bamberger saw the potential for a localized railroad line between Salt Lake City and Ogden, and by 1895 had extended his Great Salt Lake & Hot Springs Railway as far north as Farmington, where Bamberger built his Lagoon resort to serve as a destination for railroad customers. In 1896 the road was reorganized as the Salt Lake & Ogden Railway to extend the line still further, but construction north of Farmington was delayed until 1902. Ogden was reached in August 1908.

The Great Salt Lake & Hot Springs Railroad became the Salt Lake & Ogden Railroad, then the Bamberger Electric Railroad.

Coal Mining

The Bamberger Coal Company was organized on May 16, 1898 to purchase assets and business of Halm-Bamberger Coal Co., incorporated May 21, 1898, name changed to Bamberger Coal & Grain Co. on August 5, 1903, name changed back to Bamberger Coal Co. on June 30, 1939, name changed to Castle Gate Coal Co. on January 14, 1949, voluntarily dissolved on August 10, 1950 with Utah Fuel owning all 7,500 shares of stock (Utah #2233)

Metal Mining

The following comes from the December 27, 1916 issue of Copper Curb & Outlook magazine, published bi-weekly in New York City.

Governor Simon Bamberger, the new chief executive of Utah, is not a miner, but nevertheless an exceptionally successful mining man. He has never worked under ground and he professes to know little about mining engineering, ore values or mining operations but local mining men say that he is a better miner, for practical purposes, than many who are considered high in their profession. The governor, at any rate, has been a successful promoter and operator.

Soon after Governor Bamberger first went to Utah as a young man he became interested in mining. Rich discoveries in that section of the country were attracting wide attention and young Mr. Bamberger, then a hotel keeper, succumbed to the excitement and went to the Ophir district, where he became interested in the promotion of mines, near Stockton, Utah. Later he managed a small mill and smelter there.

His first large venture in the mining field was in the Big Cottonwood district in the Silver Mountain mine. There he was moderately successful. His operations were somewhat handicapped by the inaccessibility of his silver-lead mine and the shortness of the season.

Some of the most money he ever made in mining operations was in the Tintic district. He was heavily interested in the Centennial-Eureka and the Bullion Beck mines and the dividends from these mines formed a considerable part of the fortune the governor made in mining.

Mr. Bamberger was also interested in mines in the Park City and Bingham district and he owns some iron mines in Box Elder County, near Willard, Utah. He is still interested in the Song Bird and Search Light mines in the Ophir district, in the Fortuna and Argentine mines at Bingham, and the Little Bell, Lucky Bill and Silver King Consolidated mines at Park City. His mining ventures in Nevada were largely in the Pioche district. He was heavily interested in the Bamberger-Delamar mines at Delamar, Nevada, a venture which proved profitless.

He is now interested in the Gusset-Patch. the Highland Mary and the Paint mine in the Jack Rabbit district, near Pioche, and he has some mining interests in British Columbia.

Fortuna Mine (Bingham)

The Fortuna mine in Bingham was located on the mountain that separated Bingham Canyon on the west, from Salt Lake Valley on the east. The mine was origianlly known as the Fortune mine, but the name was changed when Bamberger bought the mine in 1904. Bamberger's son Sidney was the manager until his death in 1907, at which time Bamberger leased the property. Bmaberger sold the Fortuna mine leased to the adjacent Montana-Bingam Consolidated Mining company in 1916, and the Montana-Bingham company purchased the mine in 1919.

(Read more about the Fortuna mine)

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