Another story that surfaces is the one of the great, great, great, great, great Grandfather of two brothers that made their way out here in 1847-1848 some where around that time. They were on their way to the California rush when they decided to stop and look for the mine in the Santa Catalina range here north of Tucson. After months of looking they hit the mother load! After coming down to Tucson and gathering more supplies showing off the rich ore from the dump pile they made their way back up to there new found site.
A few weeks went by while they cleared the entrances to the mines, yes mines, two tunnels of solid Gold they were attacked at dawn by Apaches. They fought for three longs days until their ammo was running low. The one of them took an arrow to the heart killing him instantly!
The other brother for fear of his life ran as fast as could and made his way through Apache country back down the mountain into Tucson.
After a few days he returned fully armed and retrieved his brothers body and buried it. He took the ore he had and went on to California's gold rush country. He never talked about the incident much but later he made a Map and gave to his family.
That's where Ron Quinn comes into play. Ron being a known Treasure Hunter received a series of letters from the grandson many removed of the brothers that had fought the Indians over the Iron Door Mine and lost one sibling in the process. Ron and a close friend spent over six months I believe up there with his friends family searching for the one clue that they needed for finding the Rich Gold Mine.
That clue was an old prospect marked with a simple rock pile. They never found it.
2003
I received a series of Maps from Ron and talked my brother in law Roger into a trip at the highest point down from the top of the Catalina Mountain range. We started out one October morning it was clear and the forecast was for sunny sky's.
We started very early I had a Mine Lab Explorer 2500 packed in my backpack and we both had extra water with food enough for a few days. I packed emergency supplies just in case it happened to rain or we were stranded. I would say about 50 lb's of gear each.
The top is about 9500 feet so we parked on a ledge behind the radio towers so we could hide our vehicle from any thieves.
The hike down was pretty easy we never gave it any thought about the dangers we were in pretty fit shape and the trip seemed simple enough.
As we made are way down the trail we stopped and looked at the series of Maps that had been sent to old Ron Quinn and something stood out. The man that was sending Ron the letters and Maps was telling them just where the mine was but somehow they were going in the wrong direction!
I used dead reckoning and said if this is true and that is not then this has to be the way to the old prospect that they never found!
I told Roger I was going off the trail searching for the old Prospect that many others had failed to find even with the Maps they had it was never located in all those months of searching.
I took off cross country leaving my brother Roger with a radio we had for communication.
About an hour later I was ready to give up and told Roger I was heading back his way. I turned to go and fell about six feet down right into that Old Prospect with the pile of rocks!
It was there under the weeds covered with brush and you could not see it unless you were on top of it!
After that we continued our searching while following the clues told in the Letter Maps. It wasn't long before we
Hit another clue. An old abandoned Indian Turquoise Mine!
From that point we knew we were close. So we split up and I went on way with a electronic searching device and my in-law Roger went the other. It was at just that point the search made a turn for the worst! I was getting a signal when a storm of Ice moved in and the temperature dropped by 50 degrees and it started raining solid pieces of ice about as big as a 22 bullet!
Then I heard someone talking baby talk yes baby talk!
I looked up over the hill and mind you we were out in the middle of no where off trail and down in a gorge. It was a young Forest Ranger with non other than a total of two small Poodles! Yes Poodles!
I said WTF?
I sent Roger up there to see who it was and told him " Please don't tell him we're searching for the Iron Door Please!
He when up there and came back and told me the Ranger had said: "You'll find the Mine with the Iron Door over that Ridge to the North"!
I said " I told you not to tell him!!"
Roger said "I didn't he just bellowed it out when I walked up with a stone cold deer in the headlights sort of look"!
Roger also said " He told me if we wanted a ride out of this place he'll be up the pass at the summit road and could give us a ride is his jeep as regular folk couldn't drive down the roads he could. He also said the Ranger told him "I was looking for my wife she's out here somewhere and I can't find her".
Continued..
To be continued.
