Kimberly, Utah, located in the northwest part of Piute County, began to be settled in the 1890’s. In 1888 prospectors came to the Tushar Mountains to find a storied lost mine called “Trapper’s Pride.” It may not have been the mine they were searching for, but the men discovered two large veins of both gold and silver and founded the Gold Mountain Mining District in April of 1889.
The Annie Laurie Mine, named after Newton Hill’s daughters, was opened in 1891 and became one of the most productive in the mining district. Another prospector, William Snyder, developed the Bald Mountain Line. The town site he founded was first called Snyder City, later changed to Kimberly after an investor from Pennsylvania, Peter Kimberly, bought the Annie Laurie and other area mines. He combined all his holdings into the Annie Laurie Consolidated Mining Company and constructed a cyanidation plant to process the gold.
With the mill in place and the abundance of gold, silver and other precious metals, Kimberly began to boom. The town was divided into Lower Kimberly and Upper Kimberly, the lower part being the business district and the upper residential. In the book A History of Piute County by Linda King Newell (1999), Lower Kimberly is described:
Its main street twisted like a horseshoe around the contour of the canyon. Lower Kimberly had a post office, school, dance hall, doctor’s office, two or three general stores, several “specialty” shops, a slaughterhouse, three livery stables and as many saloons, two hotels, two barbershops, two boardinghouses, a dairy, and two newspapers, the Free Lance and the Nugget. The jail, one of the few brick structures in the town, stood toward the back of the small bench that provided a level area for some of the buildings. Inside were two iron cells, with only enough room on the front for the doors to open without hitting the wall. Those who supposedly knew said it was the strongest jail within a hundred miles.
A good jail was a good idea, since like many other mining booms town, it was a wild and woolly place. In 1900 the Gold Mountain School District was established and a school was built. Because of deep winter snows (the town was situated at approximately 9,000 feet), children attended school from April through November. Enrollment was at its highest in 1903 with 89 students.
The early 1900’s were the most productive for the area mines. After the cyanide mill was built in 1902, two hundred and fifty tons of ore could be processed in one day. Gold from the mines was shipped by stagecoach in bars measuring 6x10x10 inches and valued at over $20,000 each. The bars were stacked on the floor of the coach, between passengers’ feet, and of course, an armed guard always accompanied each shipment.
By 1902 the Annie Laurie alone employed three hundred miners, paid three dollars a day, and Kimberly’s population rose to five hundred. That year Peter Kimberly was said to have had an offer to sell out for five million dollars. By 1905 the mine was at its peak production level running three shifts, seven days a week.
Entertainment wasn’t lacking in Kimberly. The dance hall, built by the mining company, had one of the finest dance floors in the state. A young doctor, J.S. Steiner, established his medical practice by charging each family one dollar a year. If services were required, no additional fees were collected. There was constant traffic up and down the mountain roads carrying gold to the railroad at Sevier and supplies into Kimberly.
The town would begin its decline, however, in 1905 when Peter Kimberly died. The company was sold to a British company which lacked experience in managing mining operations. When the new owners instituted a scrip payment system, redeemable only at the company store, miners began to quit. The new company plunged into debt after building a new mill, followed by the Panic of 1907 which brought even more financial uncertainty.
In 1910 the Annie Laurie Consolidated Mining Company declared bankruptcy and with mine closure the demise of Kimberly soon followed. That year’s census enumerated only eight residents. The following year the company’s property, worth millions, sold at auction for a mere $49,000. Three men maintained the tunnels and buildings for a time for the new company, Sevier-Miller Coalition Company. In 1931, more workers were hired to remove a large block of ore. However, by 1938 the gold and silver were depleted and the mines were permanently closed. By 1942 most buildings had collapsed or were moved elsewhere.
One notable person born in Kimberly in 1905, Ivy Baker Priest, served as President Dwight Eisenhower’s Treasury Secretary from 1953 to 1961. She was the mother of Pat Priest, the actress who played Marilyn Munster on the television show The Munsters.
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Thanks for stopping by!
I spent many summer days roaming Kimberly with my family.
Thanks for stopping by!
Do you happen to know who owns the mines now and how to get ahold of them?
Sorry, no. Thanks for stopping by!
My 14 year old great-grandfather spent a winter in one of the Annie Laurie mines turning a rubber conveyor belt once a day so it wouldn’t crack. Any idea if it is still possible to visit the old mines?
Thanks for stopping by. Not sure about visiting the mines but according to this site there are some remains to be seen:
http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/ut/kimberly.html
My grandpa and Dad owned the silver king/ golden banner mine!
Thanks, Dwain for stopping by! Any stories about your grandpa and dad and the mines they owned? I just replied to someone else that I often revamp these stories, with new research, and include in an issue of Digging History Magazine, the successor to the Digging History blog. My writing these days goes into publishing the digital magazine — averaging these days around 90 pages or so — no ads, just stories. Available by subscription of single issue in the magazine store: https://digging-history.com/digging-history-magazine/
Would love to include any stories you might contribute about your family.
how does this town look like now?
Jennifer, most of the structures I have been able to see from the road, with the exception of a non-log building, are falling apart. The actual property has been posted with No Trespassing signs as long as I can remember.
Thirty or forty years ago, my cousin, a mine engineer, was part of a team exploring the possibility of reopening the Annie Laurie, but they determined the mine to be unsafe, so the idea was dropped.
I’ve been told that it’s unsafe to explore Kimberly because the owners are afraid that one of the tunnels or shafts underneath the old town might collapse and swallow whoever is standing above it. That actually happened at Frisco about 50 years back: a family was exploring the town when the ground gave way and swallowed the girl down a shaft. At any rate, I wouldn’t explore the town without the owner’s permission.
Hi doing research and would like to know if there are any employment records for annie laurie mine. My great grand father was an electrician.
There may be employment records but I didn’t run across any when I originally wrote this article some time ago. I will eventually have an update of this article and it will be published in Digging History Magazine (Digging History is now a digital monthly magazine with its own site, affordably available in single issue purchase and by subscriptions of varying lengths. https://www.digginghistorymag.com/the-magazine/
Sign up to be a magazine blog follower by clicking the link provided above and you’ll receive a free issue just for signing up!
I just found out today, that an apartment we lived in in Richfield, was one of the structures moved from Kimberly. We lived in the apartment in 1966-1967 Corner of 300 North and 300 West. The structure has been torn down and mafe into a Mortuary Parking lot.
Any idea what this structure would have been at Kimberly?
Kimberly is part of my family’s history and folklore. Grandpa farmed in Clear Creek and supplemented his farm income by supplying lumber and hauling freight to the mine, and some of my uncles worked in the mine. Family folklore involving the mine includes the story of a cave-in and another involving Butch Cassidy.
Calvin, thanks for stopping by. So glad you found the article interesting. Love those “family folklore” stories I receive from time to time.
According to my Grandpa, George Howard Olcott, while he was hauling freight and payroll from Richfield to the mine, there were a few times when a stranger would tie his horse to the back of the wagon and ride beside him in the wagon part of the way. The man knew that Grandpa was hauling payroll, but didn’t cause any trouble. Later, Grandpa found out that the man had been Butch Cassidy. This would have happened after Butch’s reported death in Bolivia, so the story adds fuel to the question of whether or not the stories about him being killed in Bolivia were true. While I am sure that Grandpa thought it was Butch, as for me, I have my doubts.
My uncle, Rulon Olcott, claims to have been in a cave-in at the mine. He and a friend had been working together when the cave-in occurred. According to Uncle Rulon, his friend was on one side, while Uncle Rulon was right at the cave-in. His friend escaped to the entrance to sound the alarm to summon help, then exhausted and shaking from the experience, sat down on a log to mourn for Uncle Rulon, whom he thought had died in the cave-in.
Unbeknownst to his friend, however, there was an air shaft at the site of the cave-in. Uncle Rulon climbed up the cave-in while it was still occurring and out the shaft. Seeing his friend sitting on the log mourning and being exhausted from the escape, he sat down by his friend. His friend, however, didn’t notice who had sat down beside him and continued to mourn. When his friend said that the loss of his friend was a damn shame, Uncle Rulon responded with, “Yes it is.” The man almost jumped right out of his boots, thinking he was seeing a ghost!
Great story, Calvin! Do you know about when that would have occurred? I often dedicate entire issues of Digging History Magazine (the successor to the Digging History blog which doesn’t feature many “fresh” articles these days … all efforts go into publishing the bi-monthly digital magazine). I’ve already done entire issues on Oklahoma, Colorado and Kansas. New Mexico is up for the July-August issue. So, Utah will get its turn one of these days! I will likely update this article (as I often do with these short blog articles) with more information and more stories. I revamped a few Colorado “ghost towns” articles and learned even more than the first time around!