Photo Description
The Anaconda Copper Mining Company (ACM) erected the Mountain Consolidated (or simply the "Con") mine headframe in 1928. Towering 129-1/2 feet, the steel headframe and five idlers towers replaced smaller wooden structures (the steel structures are easily seen in the photo at tar right). The Hoist House (or Engine Room), located on the hill above, lowered men and equipment into the mine and raised ore from the mine. The Con headframe is the second tallest of the 12 surviving steel headframes on the Butte Hill.
Below the headframe a mineshaft dropped almost 5,300 feet down to access crosscuts (horizontal tunnels) and drifts that intersected and followed the copper veins. The copper-bearing ore was raised to the surface and off-loaded into ore bins to await shipment via the Butte, Anaconda and Pacific (BA&P) railroad to concentrators and smelters in Anaconda.
Headframes (also known in Butte as a Gallus or Gallows Frame) were symbols of the community. In the heyday of underground mining, electricians and ropemen decorated them every Christmas and lit them each Thanksgiving Eve. The tradition continues today as volunteers light the city's remaining headframes every Christmas season.
Text from a historical marker.
