JohnD Winters and his wife, Kay walk across the tracks to catch the train for the beginning of the Crown Point Mill tour Sunday afternoon. BRAD HORN/Nevada Appeal
When JohnD Winters was a boy, his pal Carson Sprauge's father worked on the Virginia & Truckee Railroad. When the train came into Carson City with a load of gold and silver bars from the Comstock, he would hoist the boys up and tell them, "Go ahead and help yourself. Take all the gold you want."
Of course, the boys couldn't budge the heavy bars.
On Sunday, Winters, now 95, enjoyed a tour of one of the mills those precious metals came from. He held onto his wife, Kay's, arm as they walked along a rocky road.
"This is uneven ground," he said. "At 95, I'm not so stable any more."
His grandfather, John D. Winters, walked the same dry canyon in the 1800s as part owner of the Ophir Mill and foreman of the Yellowjacket mine.
"We're up here looking at what his ancestors did," said Kay Winters. "This way we can see how they lived."
They were among 91 people on a tour of the Crown Point Mill in Gold Hill. So many people called to buy tickets that organizer Barbara Mackey of the Fourth Ward School has scheduled a similar tour for Aug. 29.
"We already have 20 people on the waiting list," she said.
People were eager to see the mill, including several families who brought along their patriarchs to celebrate Father's Day.
"We got a notice in the mail, and I said 'That's what I want to do,'" said Douglas Urbani of Sparks. He was joined by his wife of 24 years, Marilyn, two daughters and a fiance.
It's rare to have access to the privately owned Crown Point, Mackey said. It was built in 1936 then closed during World War II. It almost reopened in the 1980s.
"This is an authentic mill - not a theme park," she said.
Participants were given water, a cookie "ore" bar, map and history of the mill - all packaged in an authentic ore sample bag from the Keck Museum at the Mackey School of Mines at the University of Nevada, Reno.
The tour started with a presentation at the Fourth Ward School by Fred Holabird of Holabird Mining, Environmental & Historical. He gave a brief outline of the history of milling from crude grinders to stamp mills and mercury mills to cyanide leaching mills like Crown Point.
Later, inside the mill, he described how it could treat about 100 tons of ore a day.
"This is a little baby," he said. "Out in Elko in the mills on the Carlin Trend, they all do between 50- and 75,000 tons a day," he said.
The Winters moved along wooden catwalks through the mill, gazing at huge vats where cyanide was used to separate valuable metals from rock and at bag filters where metal was collected.
"It's pretty much of a thrill," said Kay.
"It's been very interesting," said her husband of 56 years.
Although he had none of his five children with him, he had received phone calls earlier with Father's Day greetings, Winters said.
"They all called to say they wish they could join us," Kay said.
For more information on the next Crown Point Mill tour, call 847-0975.
Contact Karl Horeis at khoreis@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1219.