Working in the Mines - Summers 1948/49/50

Chapter III At Work in the Mines

  

  


Murray Mine, Sudbury(left) and bunkhouse by the mineshaft, Noranda (right)

What's it like in a mine? 

The mines I worked in (Murray Mine in Sudbury and Noranda Mine) are called drift mines. Think of a high rise office building with many floors with corridors leading off from the elevator and leading to rooms where people work, In a mine its the same but the elevator takes you down instead of up and when you get to your level the drifts (corridors/tunnels) lead to the places where the men work. The mines I worked in were much bigger than any office building. I recall working over a kilometre and a half down in the Murray mine (that's a depth equal to three times the height of the CN tower) and the network of tunnels could go on for miles so you sometimes took a train to the cave where you work. For your interest the deepest mines in Canada take men down over two kilometres and the deepest is in South Africa at just under four kilometres.  

The minerals in these mines included mainly nickel and copper but with small amounts of gold, platinum and other precious metals. When you shone your lamp on the walls you could vividly see the colourful veins of these minerals and chunks lying on the ground. It was referred to as "fools gold" because the chunks looked just like gold nuggets. We would encourage newcomers with visions of great wealth to fill their lunch bucket with them and some did.  In reality it is just a pyrite mineral and worthless before being melted down in the furnaces of the company's smelter. 

Here is a picture of me black and sweaty after a day's work.

As a place to work mines are dark, dirty, and dangerous and the farther down you go the hotter, more humid and unhealthy the air gets. Years ago miners took canaries in cages with them because if there wasn't enough oxygen in the air the canaries would be the first to die and the miners had time to leave, Its always night down there and if your lamp goes out its just black; there is no moon to guide you. And when you are deep in the mine your sweat soaks you from the Caribbean temperatures. I drank at least three litres of water a day and took salt tablets to avoid dehydration. As for danger the wall and part of the loose rock ceiling in my work area collapsed one day and luckily we were working on the other side of the cave or I would have been crushed or killed. Two young miner a few days later stepped to the side of the drift as a train approached and fell down an ore pass (a hole where the ore is dumped before being carried to the surface). Every seasoned miner can tell you stories about friends who had died or severely injured in terrible accidents such as being,trapped in a cave in, suffocated in an airless pocket. or having a wall collapse on them. Also many miners had their health destroyed and their lives shortened by silicosis, a terrible lung disease caused by breathing in the rock dust in the air. 

The Big Hole:I could read blueprints so I was selected over more seasoned miners to work in a large cavern where the ore was delivered by train to be dropped down a hole that went to the bottom of the mine. A big crushing station  was at the bottom where the ore was broken up into smaller pieces before being raised to the surface. This hole was at the 2200 foot level and dropped to the crushing station another 1600 feet (or about the height of the CN tower). In other words I was fastened to safety harness and had to scramble part way down the hole to feed feeding drilling rods and bits and later dynamite to the men working the drills to widen the hole. Once I slipped and dropped a drill rod down the hole - just imagine the clanging noise that sounded just like a church bell as it gradually faded in the distance down the great distance to the bottom of that hole.  I am terrified of heights but because it was so black I didn't have any fear of falling. At lunch time we would toss rocks down the hole just to listen to that sound fading in the distance.

Music: It was a great cavern and I got into the habit of bringing my chromatic harmonica with me to play at lunch time as we sat there with our lunch buckets. the roar of the drills had stopped and there was a silence only broken by the constant dripping of underground water.  It was like playing in a cathedral and the sound reverberating off those walls made the harmonica sound like a pipe organ.  I remember playing songs like "Peg O of my Heart, Blue Moon, Stardust and my terrible versions of parts of the William Tell Overture and Rhapsody in Blue" The men sure liked it and soon asked me to play some of their favourite sing-a-long songs, so we all got into singing as well.

 

The Changing Room: When you arrive at the mine to start your shift you first enter a changing room where you take off all your clothes and then put on your work clothes that you take down from a hook where they have been hanging from your last shift to dry out the sweat.They are stiff like boards from the salt in your sweat. Once a week you took them home to a laundromat to wash for the following week.That clothing included long underwear, jeans, socks and a long work shirt to keep you body covered. From your locker you took out your special steel-toed boots, glasses, gloves and a metal helmet. On the way out to the lift a man handed you a battery to fasten to your belt which had a wire leading to a lamp fixed onto your helmet.

From the changing room you enter a steel cage which is like a big elevator - along with about 20 other men. It can be a long way down. The lowest level I worked at was 4500 feet down – that’s like three time the height of the CN Tower in Toronto. The farther down you go the hotter it gets and even if it is sub zero on the surface it can be like a hot day on a Caribbean beach at the lowest level. 

At the end of the day you returned covered in dust mixed with oil from the pneumatic drills.Your exposed parts of your body, like your face and neck, are black. It was everything in reverse in the changing room including taking a big communal shower where you had to scrub every part of your body before changing back into your street clothes. Some men didn.t shower and just washed their hands and face before going home. they had their shower once a week on Saturday night. I wonder how their wives and kids felt about that?

The Main Work that I did in the Mine

Before talking about my main work in the mine here is a picture of the Swedish inventor, Alfred Nobel who in 1846 invented dynamite and blasting caps. Many years later he made it into a gelatinous substance that looks just like Silly Putty. Those inventions made modern mining methods possible. The Nobel Prize was named after him.

Most of my time in both the Murray Mine and Noranda Mine was spent in a cave that you climbed up to on ladders from the tunnel below. Two men worked in the cave, a certified miner and his apprentice helper. I was the helper with a lot to learn. The equipment we used in the cave included:

• a large pneumatic drill that we lifted in place on a platform facing the wall we intended to drill in,
• A smaller plugger drill for breaking up some bigger rocks left after the big blast. 
• a pneumatic slusher machine that was used to drag the broken rocks after the blast from the wall to a hole that descended out of the cave
• long crow bars to pry away loose rocks from the walls and ceiling before starting work each shift
• shovels and sledgehammers to clean up after the work done by the equipment,
• and dynamite and blasting caps and fuses when we were ready for them. 

The cycle of work basically involved first entering and inspecting the cave to see it was safe and prying off any loose rock, then deciding where to drill the holes in the wall, usually about 12 of them each about 3 or more metres feet deep, then when the holes were drilled loading them with dynamite sticks and a blasting cap with wires going to a detonator and then going off shift. At midnight all the dynamite was exploded in the mine when the miners had gone home. The houses would shake in town and you would hear a muffled boom. When you returned to your cave you cautiously entered to inspect the results of the blast and after scaling the cave to make it safe again you used the slushing machine, pluggers and shovels to clear out the loose rock. Sometime we had to place some dynamite again on a big rock in the pile of rubble, set a fuse to it and go down to the tunnel to wait for the blast and the air to clear. 

Nine hours a day and a six day week, it was hard backbreaking manual work. Their were few miners that were able to keep working after age 55. I remember an older muscular miner I worked with who complained that I was to skinny to work along with him. For the first two or three days he was right about that, but being young I quickly picked up speed and within a week I was telling him to get off his ass when he wanted to rest. He was a nice man and we got along very well after that.

Attempts to answer questions asked by readers: 

• Wages - I recall it was about $1,13/hour for a 48 hour week. Certified miners earned about $1.23/hour which wasn't much more but they could earn an additional bonus for exceeding production quotas. It was enough to rent a place and support a small family. 
• Lunchroom - Just a cave on each level with a few benches and some water available.You were expected to pack your own lunch bucket.  Many men ate at their workplace.
• Toilets - You generally peed near where you worked or donated to the channel of acid water flowing by in the drift(tunnel). I don't remember much about the toilets but they were probably dry odorless chemical toilets commonly used in mines 

Working in the Mines II - Summers 1948/49/50

Chapter II – Starting Work and Settling in

A Personnel officer was very helpful in advising me in what I had to do before reporting for works in the mines. With the troops returning from the war accommodation was scarce and he advised me that if I was to find a room I should immediately check the rental ads in the local newspaper.  He also suggested that the first thing I should do is to go down to their office to collect a paper as it was coming off the press so I would have a first crack at what might be available.  I rushed down and managed to get a paper at the first stop the delivery van made after leaving the printing plant. After several discouraging calls telling me that their rooms had already been booked a friendly woman’s voice answered and said that if I hurried down she had one room left.

I recall that the house was near the top of a steep hill. It was a large three story wooden structure and freshly painted in white with a large porch running along the front. The porch was painted a bright red which I found unusual. A middle aged and portly woman stood on the porch and greeted me with an extended hand and a nice smile. She told me that she was the owner and manager and would show me a room to consider. I observed that she seemed to have an unusual amount of jewellery on for that time of day – rings, bracelets and a necklace –  but I didn’t give it much thought. On the right as we entered was a large living room. Two men were sitting in comfortable chairs playing checkers and a younger woman sat quietly watching.  As they waved at me she said these were some of her guests. She said her guests were like a family and I would like it here. 

The room was on the second floor. Spartan with a single bed and a chair, but it looked clean and adequate, the price was very reasonable and I decided to take it and made a small down payment for the rent.

As the owner was leaving the room she looked back and said you will find this a friendly place and I should mention that two young women about your age have rooms on this floor and would I like you to meet them? Before I could answer two cheery faces poked their heads around the corner and quickly entered the room. They were nice looking girls, lightly clad and friendly and said they were looking forward to seeing me again.

Being very innocent about life I was puzzled by all this friendliness but in any case rushed off  to shop for the clothing and boots I was expected to wear for working in the mines. I slept soundly that night undisturbed.

The next day I went down in the mine for the first time.  At a level 500 feet down I met at the landing the man who was going to be my senior partner. He was a big middle aged man, I guessed to be about 45, who had been working in the mines for most of his working life. He took one look at me and asked the foreman "Why have you sent me this skinny kid? He won't be able to handle his share of the work"  

 The foreman replied, "Well with the project you have been assigned to they were asking me to find someone who can read blueprints. He is a student engineer who just arrived yesterday. Give him a few days and we'll see how he works out." 


The subject was then dropped and my partner asked me, " Have you found a place to stay yet ? I know there is almost nothing in town now with all the troops coming home" 


"Yes I have." I responded. "I guess I was lucky because I found a really nice place in a big house up on the hill. The people are really friendly and I have already met a few people including some nice girls about my age. They also serve breakfast and you can get a beer at night in the lounge." 


"Oh that's interesting. What's the address?" he asked


I gave him the address and he burst out in laughter. "Don't you realize where you are staying? It's a boarding house for those old Swedes, Pollacks and other lonely single men. If they have a family it is far way somewhere. The madam makes her money providing them with food, boot leg booze and women. Do you want to stay there? Why do you think those nice girls that you met are living there?" 


"Gosh I didn't know this. I guess it is why everyone was so friendly. Yow!! I better start looking again"


"Kid I'll do you a favour. The Devers are good friends of me and my wife. Bill and his son work in this mine and his wife rents out rooms. I'll talk to him about this." 


To make a long story short I met Mrs Devers after work, they had a nice big house across from the jail, and although she didn't have a room I was able to share a bed with another miner who worked on another shift. Mrs Devers also had a daughter a bit younger than me that I took to the movies sometime. 

Mrs Devers was a devout religious woman who was constantly criticising the men in the jail yard that she could see wandering about in their striped pyjama like prison garb. Many of these prisoners were simply lumberjacks who had come into town and in a drunken stupor had got into a punch up or other  forms of disorderly behaviour and were just there for a short time. On occasion I recognized someone I had worked with in one of the two previous summers in the camps north of Sudbury and much to Mrs Devers horror and her daughter's amusement I would cross the street to talk with them through the fence. Old white haired Whitey was a typical example (seemed very old to me back then but was probably in his mid fifties), A gentle quiet and popular man in the camp who saved up enough money now and then to take the train down to Sudbury for a few days to look for a woman, ending up terribly drunk , fighting and  and usually getting his money stolen. A few days in jail to sober up and calm down and then he was released and given a return ticket back to the camp. This was a typical holiday for many lumberjacks and much discussed with merriment in the camp when they returned,

Save as Draft

"

Working in the Mines I - Summers 1948/49/50

Chapter I – Passing the Medical and Starting Work

At the end of my first year of University in May I decided along with three close friends (Ted MacDonald, Maury Katz and Bob Barrow) to head north to work in the mines instead of another season in the lumber camps. The pay was more than twice what I had been earning in the camps, a sum sufficient to pay for my university fees and to help my parents with additional living expenses. An added incentive was the leisurely 54 hours work week instead of the basic 60 hours I had to endure in the camps.   

In early June I took the train to Sudbury and went immediately to the employment office of  The International Nickel Company that had several mines and a smelter in the area. After filling in the application forms I was sent to their medical office. Part of the medical examination was a weighing in, and I was dismayed to learn that at 133 pounds I failed to meet their minimum weight requirement of 140 pounds for students. I was devastated and as I was leaving the clinic the doctor, to soften the blow, promised that if I gained some weight at a later date the employment offer was still open. I certainly wasn’t going to gain that much weight overnight and this meant leaving my friends and taking a train farther north to spend another summer in the lumber camps.

Before heading north I joined with my friends in a bar to commiserate and say my good byes. Bob Barrow asked, “Have you thought about loading up on water and then going back to the medical office to get weighed again?”

I said, “Are you crazy? Seven pounds of water equals 112 ounces or about nine 12 ounce bottles of this Pepsi we are drinking - and the doctor would never believe me anyway.” 

Bob replied, “Well you have nothing to lose so let’s keep going; you are on your second bottle now and you have just finished eating a hot dog and chips so let’s switch to water and aim for just six or seven more.”

I had nothing to lose, other than blowing up, so we asked the bar maid for two large glasses of water. When she watched me quickly down these and gasp for air while my friends cheered me on she grinned nervously and asked. “What are you guys doing? Is this some sort of bet? “  

“No this is very serious”. Bob replied, and without adding an explanation, asked for two more glasses. 

"Well I don't know if I should, and this is the last time because I don't want to get in trouble." She served two more up.  

Turning to me Bob said, “Well if you finish those two glasses that makes six or about four and a half pounds; add the hot dog and chips and we are closer to five pounds so we are almost there."

"I can't." I said. 

"Shut up and drink." he replied, so taking a deep breath I downed the two glasses of water. "Great now you have only 3 glasses to go, and miss, three more glasses please. And have pity on this guy, because if you won't serve it he won't get a job in the mine here because he doesn't weigh enough and will have to leave Sudbury to find work."

By now I could hardly breathe but as an act of bravado I gasped out to change that order to just two more glass and another order of chips and a hot dog to wash it down.

" Well okay, but I'm really scared now, this is dangerous,  but I will do it - and don't tell my boss if he blows up." she said.

Bob phoned for a cab because there was no time to lose; I was bursting. I downed the last glass of water and staggered out to the cab with my hot dog in hand and my belt undone. In ten minutes we were at the medical centre and I raced in and God must have been with me because the doctor was still there.

I calmly said, “I have gained those pounds so please weigh me” He looked at me amused and replied. “Don’t be ridiculous. You are probably carrying stones or a brick.” 

“No,” I said, “I have really gained this weight. I didn't eat anything on the train coming up from Montreal and didn’t drink much but I’m back to my normal weight now.” 

“OK , but I don’t believe you, but you can take off all your clothes and I will weigh you again”

I stepped on the scales and when he saw the weight gain he laughed and said in amazement. “Holy Cow!, I don’t know what you did, but I guess I have to sign off so that you can get that job!” At that moment I was ready to explode and asked to leave the room and raced down the hall  for the wash room. I just made it and with a sense of relief quickly lost most of those extra pounds. That was probably the happiest pee I ever had. And I was hired.

I think the doctor knew what I had done and I learned later from Ted MacDonald that management picked up on this story and were much amused. 

I visited Bob Barrow for the last time in Ottawa two years ago. He was dying but still had the strength and sense of humour to share our memories of this event from many years ago. 

The last story about being hired is about the old foreman at the Murray mine who had the new recruits lined up for inspection before being assigned. There were about a dozen of us. He looked us over and made some cynical comments about how green we looked and how we needed toughening up. Then he asked us to show him the palms of our hands and walked up and down to feel our biceps. I was probably the skinniest and youngest in that line up but he singled me out and said, “kid I can see you have done some hard work;” I guess that lumbering experience had paid off.

Boy! Was I proud.