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Go Underground! with the
The most popular, interesting, and
instructive tour in the Northwest. Learn about hard-rock underground mining
in the richest silver district on Earth! An experienced miner is your guide as you as you walk
through the main drift of an actual underground silver mine. Using exhibits
and demonstrations of operating mining equipment, you will learn the
historical and modern-day techniques used to mine silver out of the mountains
and into our lives. The 128-year history of mining in the
Coeur d'Alenes has created a unique and colorful mining culture. Your guide
will share his personal experiences as a hard-rock miner in the Coeur d'Alene
district. The stories, demonstrations, and exhibits included in the Sierra
Silver Mine Tour are fun and educational for people of all ages and
interests.
email: info@silverminetour.org Phone: 208-752-5151 Sierra Silver Mine Tour, Inc.
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Watch
a short video of our tour!
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discountMore about our tour and Wallace
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Your tour begins when you board our sixteen passenger vintage trolley. On the short trip to and from the mine you will be treated to a narrative of the colorful history of Historic Wallace, Idaho, the Silver Capitol of the World. The city of Wallace, in its entirety, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and still has the feel and flavor of a turn-of-the-century mining camp. Once at the mine, you will be fitted with a hard hat. Before entering the mine, your guide, himself a retired miner, will give a brief overview of the fundamentals of hard-rock mining. Then into the mine, where exhibits and demonstrations will acquaint you first hand with a hard-rock miner's work and daily experiences. Your guide will explain historic and modern day mining techniques, and demonstrate pneumatic powered mining equipment. Aside from a short climb up 25 concrete steps to the mine, the 1,000 foot guided tour through the U-shaped tunnel is a comfortable slight decline on a smooth surface with no tight spaces or ups and downs. Mine History Initially discovered around 1900 the Sierra Mine's ore bodies were never rich enough to warrant active mining. Assays ran about 1/2 ounce of silver per ton of ore mined. Ownership of the mine changed hands several times. It was sporadically worked until a more thorough exploration took place in the 1960s, which involved sinking an incline shaft and running several hundred feet of drift. The showings failed to improve, and the mine remained idle until it was used as a lab site to teach local high school students mining skills. In 1982 a group of local businesspeople formed the non-profit organization Sierra Silver Mine Tour, Inc. and we began taking folks underground and teaching them how we get silver out of the mountain and into their lives. Mission The Sierra Silver Mine Tour is dedicated to educating current and future generations as to the culture, history and contemporary practices of hard-rock mining in the Coeur d'Alene Mining District. We accomplish this by providing an underground experience for our patrons, guided by retired miners, who provide: first-hand accounts, historically and technically accurate narratives, explanations of exhibits, and give live demonstrations of the operation of pneumatic powered mining machinery. Additionally, on the way to and from the mine our trolley drivers provide a tour of Wallace and factual narratives of local historical events.
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