A special little place to go.

[tamrock]

Yesterday was sunny and got up in to the 50's. I'm working at home more to cut down expenses and it's the holiday times, so it's good for us peddlers to give all those sales prospects a little R&R from the likes of our kind. I decided to take the pup's out to the old coal camp east of where I live. I had to keep em on the leash, due to it being the land of the coyotes who have no fear of people around here, because they have never been messed with like the their vermin cousins out in wide open places like Wyoming and Nevada who run like hell when you just stop your vehicle a 1/4 mile a way from those guys, because they know when a vehicle comes to a stop the next thing is most likely gunfire. That's a very fun activity to partake in with my comrades in northern Nevada and a 7mm Remington Mag. My dog Ollie thinks their other dogs to play with and my little dog Bella would be snatched up a flash if they saw her out running around on her own. Over the years I've picked up many relic's that do tell a story of the people who lived and worked at this coal camp long ago. I find no stories or recorded info of the place I believe was called Mitchell. I can only surmise a story of these folk by the artifacts I find out there. You only access the place by foot because the road access is locked and gated.

 

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[outdoorfunblonde]

Nice!! I love to check out the places out in the middle of nowhere.
Cool finds... lucky you!!
I can't wait till I start finding those better things...
I'm finally getting info together about where I should be going!! LOL helps to know...
HH

 

[vpnavy]

Nice photographs! Thanks for sharing...

 

[old digger]

Interesting finds! I see a trip pan for a #4 leg trap in your first photo. Maybe if you had a couple of those greyhound dogs they could keep up with them coyotes and give them a good ''lickin''. That seems to be the problem around urban areas. Too many of the smaller pets are snatched up coyotes and nobody wants to do anything lest any censure.

 

[tamrock]

Interesting finds! I see a trip pan for a #4 leg trap in your first photo. Maybe if you had a couple of those greyhound dogs they could keep up with them coyotes and give them a good ''lickin''. That seems to be the problem around urban areas. Too many of the smaller pets are snatched up coyotes and nobody wants to do anything lest any censure.

It does look like a trap trip from that view, but I think it's some kind of Sterno stove, as the disk could swing out of the way on a pivot on the handle. I have this picture with a better view of it. I do wonder what that U shape hook in the center of the horseshoes looking thing is and what it was used for? I looks like it could have been pounded into a timber to make a hitch or something like that? It seem it's a blacksmith hand forged piece for something? As for the Coyote, I've been checking these out online. Crosman | Airguns | Rifles | PCP | Rogue® .357 It's not a firearm that would be outlawed in the city limits I don't think? and I'm a good distance from any residences. The Coyote hang out allot at this old coal mine and I've got plenty of tall grass to setup an ambush. I use a piece of cellophane torn from a pack of cigs to make a wounded rabbit sound and they come running in with no concern at all when I use that call. You can see on their faces, they just can't believe what their hearing. It's their most favorite sound hearing a hurt bunny.

 

[RGINN]

What county is that in? I was lookin through some of my Colorado research material and found some brief place name references to 'Mitchell', and also 'Critchell', and I can probably find a little more on the internet if I know the county.

 

[tamrock]

What county is that in? I was lookin through some of my Colorado research material and found some brief place name references to 'Mitchell', and also 'Critchell', and I can probably find a little more on the internet if I know the county.

The place is just a little NE of Lafayette, Colorado. in Boulder County.The name could be also 'New Mitchell' I'm not sure?. There is an elevation marker that says 'Mitchell' out there. I did find it was a site under the super fund to clean up old mine sites like they did in Leadville. All they did to clean up this site was bulldoze everything on the surface and push it all in the old shaft and cover it all up from what I can tell.

 

[texasred777]

Tamrock, if you find that you can't legally use an air gun, find out if a bow and arrow is legal. Here in Mountain Home, Idaho, it's illegal to even shoot a bb gun in the city limits! But, bows are ok! Sounds like the law-makers here are just a little mixed up as the potential dangers of a bow and arrow. Just for curiosity, I bought a little 50# crossbow pistol a year or so ago. It's just hanging on the wall, never been used. I've been thinking ever since I got it, that I would take it with me out to the place I go to shoot. Just never think about it until I get out there. I guess I should buy one of those target cubes that I see in Walmart. They're something like 2 feet cubed. Then I could use the little bow out in the back yard.
Though I never went hunting with it, I used to have a 45# recurved bow. It had quite a bit of power.

 

[RGINN]

Well that helps. Mitchell or New Mitchell is the name of the coal mine. It's up close to Erie. It was active in the late 1800's, and they had barracks for the workers there, which somebody tried to blow up during the coal strikes, if it's the same place. A very good website that I like is www.coloradohistoricnewspapers.org. Search all the papers for Mitchell coal camp, or Mitchell coal mine, and you'll find a lot of results to look through. Which I was doing, but I decided to search up Sand Creek and was re-reading Chivington's original report and it caught my eye that he said he killed 500-600 Indians but only captured about 550 horses or mules. I missed those stats before. In good times, you could make a fair estimate of the number of fighting men in a village by the size of the horse herd. It doesn't look like anybody ever questioned that point so I'm off to do a little more research on that.

 

[Red_desert]

Looks like wide open space, a good hiking in backpacking site.

 

[tamrock]

Well that helps. Mitchell or New Mitchell is the name of the coal mine. It's up close to Erie. It was active in the late 1800's, and they had barracks for the workers there, which somebody tried to blow up during the coal strikes, if it's the same place. A very good website that I like is www.coloradohistoricnewspapers.org. Search all the papers for Mitchell coal camp, or Mitchell coal mine, and you'll find a lot of results to look through. Which I was doing, but I decided to search up Sand Creek and was re-reading Chivington's original report and it caught my eye that he said he killed 500-600 Indians but only captured about 550 horses or mules. I missed those stats before. In good times, you could make a fair estimate of the number of fighting men in a village by the size of the horse herd. It doesn't look like anybody ever questioned that point so I'm off to do a little more research on that.

Thanks link RG, I'm not positive of this site I poke around at. I can walk to it from my house, plus that's the only way you can get in to the spot. I've lived by it for over 20 years now and have been picking up old stuff over the years. This is a post I put up on an old 45-70 shell casing I found close to the mine site...http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/422989-i-found-u-m-c-45-70-shell-yesterday.html ... I'll never be able to prove it was part of the coal strikes here where I live, but the Colorado state Militia I believe did have old Army surplus U.S. Springfield trap door rifles in their arsenal. They were called to protect the mine properties from the striking miners who were blowing up the mine properties in the days of the strikes. BWT, Chivington's soul is most likely living for evermore in torment.

 

[Red_desert]

I've found old shell casing around old mines before. Once it seemed like a cache, remove one and up comes another until I'd stopped digging....these would stick to the magnet on your pick.