Galería de Minerales FMF

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OLD MINE VERSUS MODERN MINE 1

A photograph from the early 1900s captures the sweeping vista and desolate beauty of Ojuela. Anchoring the view in the lower right, the weathered, steel head frame of the Socavon Shaft stands as a stark monument against the rugged landscape.

A century later, the gaze northward finds only silence and skeletal remains. The landscape is dominated by a profound shadow, a scar on the earth that refuses to heal; the Boca de Mina, the Mouth of the Mine. This vast, dark chasm — the original glory hole — is a gaping wound testifying to a history of arduous toil.

While this great mine endures, carved in stone, the works of man have proven fleeting. The steel head frame of the Socavon shaft has surrendered to the elements, its bones scattered by the wind. Entirely vanished is the company town that was once a world unto itself. Where grids of simple houses sheltered five thousand souls, the wind now scours empty ground, and faint outlines in the dirt are the only ghosts of those dusty streets. No echo remains of the modest schoolhouse, the offices, the shafts, the workshops, no phantom of the bustling stores that once anchored this outpost of rock and toil.

The mountain gave its treasure, and in the passage of a century, it has reclaimed all but the wound. The great mine has outlived its children, its open mouth now a monument to their memory and the profound quiet that follows. (Author: silvia)