Borax???

I thought Death Valley became a tourist hot spot because it was the lowest spot in North America and unique enough to draw people. I also thought so many people had died there that  death was its distinction. (only one known death during the '49 Gold Rush) What I did not know was Death Valley was mining country when borax was discovered there in 1881.

Borax, you say? Laundry detergent or additive? Mineral salts?

Borax is a mineral that can be used for many things, including boric acid, glaze for pottery, flux for welding and soldering, fiberglass, and borosilicate glass. the Pacific Coast Borax Company was in authority for the operation of all the borax mines in Death Valley. 

Chinese laborers were recruited from San Francisco to scrap borax off the salt flats; the process was/is called cotton ball. The borax was carried to wagons which went to the refinery. The Chinese laborers received $1.30 per day, less lodging and the cost of food they bought at the company store. The laborers lived in adobe cottages near the mining area. The Harmony Company folks lived in Furnace Creek, the oasis area some 5 or so miles away.

Temperatures in Death Valley range from 130º in the summer to 32º in the winter. (Temperatures at Furnace Creek reach at least 90º on an average of 189 days a year.) Parts of the valley receive less than two inches of rain annually. 

Special wagons were designed to carry the refined ore to the railroad 165 miles away. A water tank was attached to the end of the wagon 'train' when it went to the mining flats. This was the water supply for the Chinese laborers.

the back wheel is about 6-7' diameter

water tank

A team of 14-20 mules were needed to pull the wagons on the 165 mile trip to the railroad depot. Thus the trademark of the 20 mule team borax.

a view of some of the salt flats

Because the cost of transporting the borax ore was so high, a refinery plant was built in 1882 to eliminate transporting the waste products and the final product. 

the refinery

walking to a borax bed

looks like snow drifts

crystalized salt

crunchy, dirty

In the time from 1885 to 1933, Christian Brevoort Zabriskie was connected to Pacific Coast Borax and Death Valley. In the beginning he supervised hundreds of Chinese workers in the borax mines. Eventually he became vice president and general manager of the Pacific Coast Borax Company. In the end of borax mining he overlooked the progress of changing Death Valley from a mining site to a natural monument and tourist attraction.

Stephen Mather, a sales manager for the Pacific Coast Borax Company, began the use of Twenty Mule Teams as the symbol of their company. Mather left the company and began visiting national parks, but was disappointed to see how bad management led to their poor conditions. He wrote a letter to the Secretary of the Interior with his concerns. The Secretary made Mather the first director of the National Park Service in 1916.  (There is much more to Mather's story than what I have included. It is worth the quick read on the attached link.)

The cost of bringing borax to the railroad centers and the discovery of borax in other parts of the country and world brought about the demise of mining in Death Valley in the mid 1920s. In 1926 Pacific Coast Borax Company invited Mather back to Death Valley to see the beauty and to convince him it should be a national park. The borax company had begun to shift its focus from mining to tourism and planned to build the Furance Creek Inn. (We stayed at the Furnace Creek Ranch which was the housing for the company employees, but not the Chinese workers.) Once Mather visited he realized Death Valley was worthy, but felt his past connections to the company might be controversial in making the area a national park. The borax company, with the help of men like Christian Zabriskie, went about creating glowing articles and a radio program extolling the beauty and virtues of Death Valley. Mather died in 1930. His assistant Horace Albright became the next director and was able to propose Death Valley as a national monument in 1933. On October 31, 1994 it became Death Valley National Park.