Native copper

“ Copper by itself is so soft that it would not be of much use to man, except the experience they would gain of melting and molding. In our own country the aboriginal inhabitants were well acquainted with copper, and even knew how to mold it. Yet, except as just pointed out, it is not probable that it exerted any marked influence on their development.7 In the old world supplies of native copper are limited, and recourse must be had to the ores of copper. Now these ores, such as copper-pyrites, are nearly always of a bright color, and as such would attract the attention of primitive man. ”

“ They were probably the result of the want of tin necessary for the manufacture of bronze. Copper by itself would not be very much more useful for cutting purposes than stone, on account of its softness, and therefore is not likely to have superseded stone, which is so much more widely spread, and to the use of which mankind had been accustomed for many centuries. The native copper of Lake Superior has been worked by the Red Indians from an unknown period; and had it offered them a material much better than stone, there would have been an age of Copper in North America. ”

“ Native copper, sometimes termed by miners malleable or virgin copper, occurs as a mineral having all the properties of the smelted metal. It crystallizes in the cubic system, but the crystals are often flattened, elongated, rounded or otherwise distorted. Twins are common. Usually the metal is arborescent, dendritic, filiform, moss-like or laminar. Native copper is found in most copper-mines, usually in the upper workings, where the deposit has been exposed to atmospheric influences. ”

“ He pointed out several new forms of crystals in the slags from his blast furnaces, and he also beautifully illustrated the theory of the formation of native copper from the vaporized chloride of copper, while working the Atacamite of Peru.
"The most important of his labors were of an eminently practical nature, such as discovering the best and most economical methods of mixing the various copper ores of commerce, so as to make one ore flux another, and thus to obtain the largest yield of metal at the least expense. ”

“ Near this spot veins of Native Copper may be frequently seen at low water during spring tides, [229] and a mass of this metal was once raised which weighed 104 pounds. Copper is the only metallic substance that has been found in any quantity in the Serpentine formation; and this has never occurred except native, as in the above instance, or in the state of Green Carbonate, so that the mining adventurer need not anticipate much advantage from it. ”

“ As in many parts of the world native copper is found scattered over the surface of the earth in large lumps or masses, it naturally attracted the attention of barbarous tribes much sooner than iron, which very rarely occurs in the native state ”

“ The author was of the opinion that the Indians of the Lake Superior district made copper implements for themselves, and also for extensive barter, and did not see how any reasonable man could assert that the Indians knew nothing about the use of the native metal. Professor Putnam discussed the same subject in his paper on the North American copper implements and ornaments under his charge in the Peabody Museum. He had no doubt that the Indians used copper, and that its use was contemporary with that of polished stone implements. The native copper was hammered, not molded, into shape ”

“ But, while it is certain that a combination of circumstances has served to mislead the public mind with regard to the geological situation and existing quantity of that metal, it is no less certain that a greater quantity of insulated native copper has been discovered upon the borders of Lake Superior, than in any other equal portion of North America. ”

“ On Keweenaw Peninsula, which protrudes into Lake Superior from its southern shore, is found that remarkable occurrence of native copper within a series of igneous rocks of varied types and colors. Fragments of this copper, some weighing several hundreds of pounds each and masked in a coat of green malachite, have under the name of “drift” or “float” copper been collected at many localities within a broad “fan” of dispersal extending almost to the very limits of glaciation (Fig. 331) . ”

“ Sometimes native copper, and carbonate of copper, are also present in the same specimen. In some instances, a partial decomposition has taken place, converting its green color into greenish-white, or perfect white, and rendering it so soft as to be cut with a knife. Sometimes the grains or masses of native copper are interspersed among the prehnite, and slender threads of this metal occasionally pass through the aggregated mass of greenstone, prehnite, &c., so that, on breaking it, the fragments are still held together by these metallic fibres. ”

“ A small United-States coin is termed a “nickel.”
Fig. 411.—Native copper.
Copper is the next metal we have to notice. It has been known for centuries. It is encountered native in many places. The Cornish copper ore is the copper pyrites. The fumes of the smelting works are very injurious, containing, as they do, arsenic and sulphur. The ground near the mines is usually bare of vegetation in consequence of the “smoke.” Sheet copper is worked into many domestic utensils, and the alloy with zinc, termed Brass, is both useful and ornamental. ”

“ In addition to these masses of native copper, an ore of that metal has long been known to the lake traders as the green rock, in which the characteristic substances are the green and blue carbonates of copper, accompanied by copper black. It is situated upon Keweena Point, 280 miles above the falls of the Ste. Marie. The ore is embraced by what is apparently a recently formed crag; and, although it is of a kind and so situated as to make an imposing appearance, there is little certainty of its existence in large quantities in this formation. ”

“ The conclusion now universally accepted among archæologists is that there is no reason for attributing the working of the copper deposits or fabrication of the implements to any other people than the Indians. The early explorers found both the northern and southern tribes in this country using implements and ornaments of native copper often in common with those of stone. From South America almost to Canada various travellers refer to this metal being in the possession of or employed by the natives. ”

“ I have always understood that native copper occurring in small flakes or nuggets and sparsely distributed, is of but little practical value, and that copper can only, as a rule, be successfully worked from ores that are rich and easy of access. ”

“ According to his report, native copper exists in two or three different deposits about Lake Superior, where it is found in the richest abundance, both in veins and in large masses in the native state. Dr. Jackson also states, that he has seen one of these masses, twenty feet long, nine feet wide, and from four to six inches in thickness, and weighing about twenty tuns. He adds, that in a single year, thirty-three men, of whom only twenty were properly miners, had taken out forty-three tuns of ore, yielding thirty tuns of pure copper. ”

“ The metal occurs in small quantities at Bonmahon (Waterford) ; copper and cobalt at Mucross, and grey copper ore in Cork, Kerry, Tipperary, and Galway. In 1855 some 1157 tons were shipped to Swansea.
The Greenlanders and Eskimos cut and hammer their pure native copper, without smelting, into nails, arrow-piles, and other tools and weapons. Mackenzie (second voyage) tells us that pure copper was common among the tribes on the borders of the Arctic Sea, whose arrow-heads and spear-heads were cold-wrought with the hammer. ”

“ It exists in every variety of form. According to the opinion of the lamented Houghton, this region contains the most extensive copper mines in the known world. The native copper (p. 118) boulder discovered by the traveler Henry in the bed of the Ontonagon river, and now in Washington, originally weighed thirty-eight hundred pounds. A copper mass of the same material, found near Copper Harbor, weighed twelve hundred pounds. At Copper Falls, there is a vein of solid ore which measures nine feet in depth, and seven and a half inches in thickness. ”

“ In America the Indians in the Lake Superior region found native copper weathered out of the rocks and later mined it, and they too pounded it into knives, axes, needles, and ornaments, but probably never learned to melt it and mold their tools. ”

“ The common ore is native copper, often associated with native silver, the two remaining, chemically, quite distinct. Some masses of copper occur that are too large to handle and must be cut by cold chisels, a method that costs more for labor than the value of the metal. The Lake Superior mines produce 140,000,000 pounds of copper a year, while those of Montana made the gigantic output of 228,000,000 pounds in 1896. ”

“ In the great copper-mines upon Lake Superior, copper is found in the native state mixed with the rock, and does not have to be smelted; but in most mines the ore must go through a process very like the one described before metallic copper can be obtained.
It does not matter how remote a region may be, how intense the heat or cold, or how desert-like the surrounding country, men will go to it if minerals of value are discovered; and there they will perhaps spend the whole of their lives, mining these substances which are of such importance to the industries of the world. ”

“ Implements and ornaments of native copper are distributed commonly or sparingly throughout a large portion of the eastern half of the United States and in some states west of the Mississippi River. Outside of our own state, numbers of them have been recovered in Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, and West Virginia, and also from the mounds and stone graves and village-sites in the states of Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, and Georgia. ”

“ The Indians who came to trade at the posts on the upper Mississippi had knives, hatchets, and arrow-heads cast of copper, evidently of native manufacture. Some of the Indians revealed the existence of large deposits of pure metallic copper, which they said were situated near the shores of a vast lake or fresh-water sea far to the north. These Indians were induced by rich presents to conduct an exploring party to the mines. ”

“ The Copper Indians set a great value on this native metal even at the present day, and prefer it to iron for almost every use except that of a hatchet, a knife, and an awl. "For these three necessary implements", writes Hearne, "copper makes but a very poor substitute." ”

“ Moreover, with the exception of Spain and Chili, the United States has no serious rivals in copper production,—Montana and Michigan, producing the greater part of the output. The famous Calumet and Hecla mine, in Michigan, is now down 4,000 feet and still yields ore. The most copper ores are not difficult to distinguish. Every one is familiar with the ruddy hue of pure copper, the color of the native metal. ”

“ Here are also two very rare and curious specimens of yellow and grey sulphuret of copper, in forms resembling a cube, the latter being pseudomorphous.
The Royal Geological Society at Penzance possessed many valuable and rare specimens; among the earthy species may be enumerated, calcedony, sodalite, haiiyne, petalite, colophonite, vesuvian, &c. In the metallic branch, is carbonate of lead, specular iron, arseniate of iron, the oxide, carbonate, arseniate and phosphate of copper, native gold, found in the Cornish Tin Stream Works ”

“ The smelter and blast furnace have an output of 15-18 tons of blister copper daily. Native labor of fair quality may be obtained at one fifth of the cost in the United States, while the ore is said to be six times as rich as most of that in the West. Considerable water power is available. An automobile road has been constructed from the station Pachacayo 60 miles to the mine.
There are other rich copper deposits in Peru, in Huancavelica, Cuzco, Arequipa, Ica, Apurimac, Junín, Ancash, Cajamarca ”

“ In fact we know for certain that such an independent Copper Age was developed not only in the region of the Great Lakes of North America, but also amongst the Bantu peoples of Katanga and other parts of Central Africa. Copper is not an alloy like bronze, but a [Pg 24] soft, easily-worked metal occurring in large quantities and in a tolerably pure state near the surface in many parts of the world. ”

“ The copper was, no doubt, recognised as a malleable rock, differing from all others in its ductility, so that it could be fashioned, with the aid of a hammer-stone, to any desired form. By this means the ancient miners of Lake Superior provided themselves with the most suitable tools for their mining operations, and were probably the manufacturers of most of the widely diffused copper implements. But for general purposes, both of industry and war, American man had to be content with the more abundant chert, hornstone, and quartzite. ”

“ A variety of copper ornaments are worn by the Kafirs of the northern parts of the Transvaal who have known how to extract the metal from the mineral and to smelt it into pure ore. No mining operations in search of copper have, as I believe, yet been carried on by white men in the country. At an Agricultural Show which was held in 1876 at Potchefstroom, the chief town in the southern part of the Transvaal, prizes were awarded for specimens of the following minerals found in the country itself. Gold-bearing quartz, alluvial gold, copper, tin, lead, iron, plumbago, cobalt, and coal. ”