Tom Schweich  

Horseshoe Basin

Vidler Tunnel

Portal of the Vidler Tunnel	Water collection system for the Vidler Tunnel.	Portal of the Vidler Tunnel	The unmistakeable Cirsium scopulorum along the old road.

Vidler

The Vidler tunnel is in Mount Edwards, a short distance north of Argentine Pass and about 5 miles east-northeast of Montezuma. It was originally intended to be a railroad tunnel and serve a proposed narrow-gage railroad extending from Silver Plume to Dillon. Work was started on the tunnel in 1901, and for a time headings were driven from both the east and west portals. The west portal was abandoned after the face had been carried about 700 feet, but in spite of repeated changes in ownership and reorganizations, the eastern section of the tunnel was gradually advanced until in 1911 it had a length of 5,118 feet. No work is known to have been done since that time, however, and the breasts of the east and west sections are reported to be separated by about 1,700 feet. The altitude of both portals is about 11,650 feet. The east half of the tunnel trends S. 70° 47' W., and the west half N. 58° 17' E. The tunnel was not accesible at any time during the writer's visits, but some information was found in reports by G. W. Schneider, J. W. Astley, and Herbert Strickland, quoted in a prospectus of the Argentine Tunnel Railway Co. The eastern sectionof the tunnel is reported to cut veins at 227, 330, 380, 500, 885, 1956, and 2,175 feet from the portal. Most of the veins were small and contained only quartz and pyrite, but three carried lead-sinc ore. Galena and sphalerite containing 12 ounces or less of silver to the ton and very little gold were found in the veins cut at 227, 265, and 885 feet, but only the last vein, known as the Flossie or Red Light, was string enough to encourage much development. This vein strikes N. 33° E. and dips about 85° NW. It carried galena and sphalerite in a quartz gangue, and the ore-bearing part of the vein ranged from 1 to 18 inches in width, averaging about 6 inches. Some ore was stoped in this vein both north and south of the main crosscut tunnel. No production figures have been found, but the property has venver been an important producer (Lovering, 1935).

Shoe Basin Mine

Argentine Trailhead

Information sign on the portal of the Pennsylvania Mine.	Portal of the Pennsylvania Mine.

The Pennsylvania Mine was initially developed in 1879, according to the EPA, and produced gold, silver, lead, copper and zinc.

The mine is the largest anthropogenic contributor of heavy metals in the Snake River Watershed, which is the most impaired watershed in the state. Exposure to the metals can cause health problems in humans and wildlife.

Brian Lorch, the county's Open Space and Trails Department director, said the Pennsylvania property is owned by a small company called TransPacific Tourism of Colorado, which was formed by a Colorado couple specifically to buy the 169-acre property in 1990 and then sell it to foreign investors. The investors walked away after the mine's environmental problems became apparent, leaving the couple stuck with the property ever since, Lorch said. The county then worked with the landowners to create a restrictive covenant in 2008 that transferred all development rights off the property, he said, and the county would like to buy the land to protect it as open space if the mine is ever cleaned up enough that liability isn't an issue (Langley, 2015).

The EPA also plans to work with a private landowner who has owned the neighboring Jumbo Mine property for about 40 years. Because that property owner didn't cause the mine pollution, Paul Peronard EPA's on-scene coordinator said, the EPA will pay for the cleanup, which will likely cost less than a tenth of the Pennsylvania Mine reclamation (Langley, 2015).