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INTRODUCTION

Cobalt’s Heritage Silver Trail was first organized in 1985 and has been expanded and upgraded year by year. The trail provides access to some of the important sites that make up part of Cobalt’s mining history. The sites feature adits, open-stopes, shaft houses, mill sites and tailings ponds. Each site is enhanced by signs and diagrams. In addition, collections of mining equipment with interpretive signs are displayed at the Willet Green Miller memorial site located beside the Pan Silver headframe at site 14 and at the Jack Kosa Memorial Park located near by.

This exhibit illustrates, through historical photographs and equipment displays, how mining in the Cobalt Camp brought dramatic changes to the development plans for northern Ontario and had far reaching effects on the mining industry in general. As work progressed and the camp developed, there were corresponding changes in working conditions, equipment and processes over time.

It was in 1903, while building the Temiskaming and Northern Ontario Railway, that the blasting exposed rock formations containing veins of silver, cobalt and nickle minerals. The many discoveries an developments that followed created the great silver rush that brought the Cobalt Camp into existence. By 1905, the rush was in full bloom. The first serious production of silver began in 1904, totalling 206,875 ounces. By 1911, the annual production had reached 31,507,791 ounces. By 1922, a total of 333,402,68 ounces of silver had been shipped from the Cobalt Camp. From this peak, the production gradually declined. All of the area mines are now closed but the heritage value is being preserved for future generations.

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Heritage Silver Trail Sites
29 April 2006
The Heritage Silver Trail, Town of Cobalt and Coleman Township, Ontario, Canada

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The Heritage Silver Trail Sites

• Townsite Mine, Shafthouse and Glory Hole (Site 1 & 2)
• McKinley-Darragh Mill (Site 3)
• Little Silver Vein (Site 4)
• Cart Lake Tailings Lookout (Site 5)
• Nipissing 96 Shaft (Site 6)
• Nipissing Hill Lookout (Site 7)
• Nipissing 81 "Open Cut" Mine Site (Site 8)
• Right-of-Way Mine Site (Site9)
• Former Agnico Eagle Mines Ltd. "Refinery Site" (Site 10)
• Larose Blacksmith Shop (Site 11)
• Nipissing "73" Meyer shaft Mine Site (Site 12)
• Coniagas Headframe (Site 13)
• Willet Green Miller Memorial Site (Site 14)
• Northern Customs Concentrator, "The 104 Mill" (Site 15)
• Colonial Mine Site (Site 16)
• Nova Scotia Mine and Mill Site (Site17)
• Crown Reserve Mine Site (Site 18)
• The Silver Sidewalk (Site 19)
* Jack Koza Memorial Park

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Our story of the search for silver will be told through a collection of historical photographs, illustrations and photographs of the mining equipment displayed at sites on the Heritage Silver Trail, in Cobalt, Ontario, Canada.

The story is organized into 5 storylines:
(1) Introduction
(2) Historical Photographs - surface views.
(3) Historical Photographs - underground views.
(4) Willet Green Memorial Site.
(5) Jack Koza Memorial Park.

NOTE:
Click on the picture to see an enlarged view of any picture throughout the exhibit.