The Skidoo Mill

The imposing structure of the Skidoo Mill.

Skidoo: Death Valley's most famous ghost town. At its height, it was home to over 700 people, and had many saloons, billiards parlors, general goods, and its endless network of high-grade gold mines that produced over 1.5 million US Dollars. As a result of its remote location and the resulting extreme cost of transportation of said ore, the only cost-effective solution to mine here was to construct a mill on site. The first mill was only five stamps, which was constructed before the famed 23 mile water pipeline to a spring below Telescope Peak (Hummingbird Spring) in 1909, built first to provide water to the town and later extended to power the mill. The existing mill was built after the original mill was destroyed by a fire on June 2, 1913. Five stamps were recovered, and the mill was rebuilt and in service before the end of the year. This is the mill that stands today. Most of its outside structure collapsed in the 1960s or 70s, but what remains was spared from the Park Service's haphazard shovel of destruction, which had removed most of the rest of Skidoo's remains around the same time. A more complete history of Skidoo will be written in a future post.

The stabilized lower platform

The mill has fifteen stamps, a respectable number, and they are very very large compared to other mills from the same area and time. It also claims to be the largest water-powered mill in the Mojave Desert, even though as the pipeline was torn up it was run by a gasoline engine on site. The pipeline powered a Pelton wheel that then sent power to the massive flywheels and belts which sent power to the automatic ore feeders, primary jaw crushers, and eventually the massive stamp batteries. From the stamps the ore slurry, which was mixed with quicksilver (mercury) was piped to concentrating tables where most of the sand was removed and then into settling tanks where the heavy gold would settle out of the mercury and create a kind of gold cake, which was melted into four-pound bullion blocks, because that was the largest size the stage would ship. By comparison, the silver bullion shipped from nearby Panamint City was cast into a ball  weighing over four hundred pounds by some reports so that it couldn't be stolen!

The two largest stamp batteries

The mill has been very well stabilized by the park service, and is relatively safe (though not recommended) to walk on. Many of the floorboards are new, but the original boards are massive, some of them 18 inches across; old growth timber of a sort that just doesn't exist anymore. Unfortunately, some of the tops of the stamps were removed, but it is unknown when or by whom.

From a rock's point of view

Huge square nuts in the massive timbers

Union Iron Works, San Fransisco, Cal.

The stamps are about eight inches in diameter each.

These large flywheels were the power take-off from the peloton wheel
and later gasoline motor. Belts would have run all through the structure.

The huge bullwhips that powered the stamp batteries are about three feet
across. They had to be built of wood because any metal would
have shattered from the vibrations they endured.

Through the battery

Looking down into the battery

Four bolts

The center of the wheel is reinforced with cast iron.

Edge of the wheel

Five Stamps

A good idea of the size of these wheels. 

Top of the batteries

The main flywheels.

These older pictures show more of the mill. This
pipe was the end of the pipeline and powered the
mill. From the mill it ran out into the canyon
below, where it eventually sank into the desert.

Overview of the main floor.

Automatic ore feeder behind the stamps.

The hand at left gives some scale to the size of the stamps and the
massive iron crankshaft.