Lead King Mine (Lippincott Lead Mine; Lippincott Mine; Lippencott Mine; Confidence Nos 1 & 2 claims; Lead King Nos. 3 & 5-8 claims; Southern Lead Mine), Big Dodd Spring, Ubehebe Mining District, Cottonwood Mountains, Panamint Mts (Panamint Range), Inyo County, California, USAi

Regional Level Types
Lead King Mine (Lippincott Lead Mine; Lippincott Mine; Lippencott Mine; Confidence Nos 1 & 2 claims; Lead King Nos. 3 & 5-8 claims; Southern Lead Mine)	Mine
Big Dodd Spring	Spring
Ubehebe Mining District	Mining District
Cottonwood Mountains	Mountain Range
Panamint Mts (Panamint Range)	Mountain Range
Inyo County	County
California	State
USA	Country

A former Pb-Ag-Zn-Cu-Au mine located in secs. 13 & 24, T15S, R40E, MDM, 5.2 km (3.2 miles) N of Big Dodd Spring and about 7 km S of Ubehebe Peak, on the SW margin of Racetrack Valley, on National Park Service land (Death Valley National Park). MRDS database stated accuracy for this location is 10 meters.

Alternate coordinates provided- 36°38'04-N, 117°34'54-W.

The Lippincott claim group, comprising eight lode mining claims and one millsite, is located in the northwest corner of the monument and in the southwest corner of Racetrack Valley immediately north of the monument boundary, although the Lead King Nos. 3 and 5-8 are situated partially outside the monument. The property is about thirty miles south of Ubehebe Crater on the Racetrack Road four miles south of Ubehebe Peak on the north side of a ridge between Racetrack and Saline valleys.

The site today consists of three main areas. On the north slope is the mine camp of six wood and tarpaper cabins and an ore tipple constructed by Lippincott about 1942. It is just below the main tunnel which lies on this slope at an elevation of about 3,750 feet. Another group of three cabins was erected on the slope southeast of the workings, access to which is via a road through the middle of the Homestake Talc Claim. The mine workings seen by this writer along the road on the northeast flank of the ridge consisted of numerous adits and at least two vertical shafts, plus some tramway remains, all encompassed in an area measuring about 1,600 by 200 feet. Altogether the claim group contains about 2,000 feet of level and inclined underground workings--the main tunnel, Addison workings, Confidence No. 1, Confidence No. 2, and Inspiration.

The earliest recorded mining activity on the lands now constituting the Lippincott Lead Mine may have been that associated with the Wedding Stake Group of seven claims "located on the east slope of Ubehebe range, easily accessible from the Race Track." They were discovered in December 1906 by Joseph H. Crook, Sim Boysdon, Walter Clements, and possibly Charles del Bondio. The Inyo Copper Mining and Smelting Company was also engaging in extensive operations in that vicinity by 1908. The Raven lead and silver property, sixty miles southwest of Bonnie Claire and five miles north of Dodd Spring, was being explored from about 1917 through 1926. It was originally owned by J. Crook and Archie Farrington of Big Pine, and was situated at an elevation of 3,800 feet, which corresponds with that of the present Lippincott works. According to George Lippincott, Jr., the Lippincott Mine produced and shipped ore during World War I, which would tend to support the theory that these two mines were located on the same ore body. In 1926 the Raven was reported as having 2,000 feet of underground tunnels, but it was idle at that time. The Raven appears to have been the only silver-lead mine between Ubehebe Peak and Big Dodd Spring mentioned prior to reports on the Lippincott Mine property beginning in the 1930s.

According to McAllister, the Lead King mining claims (aka Southern Lead Mine in later years) were held by Phil E. Day in 1934 and quitclaimed to R.B. and L. Walls in 1939. This property included some old workings near the main tunnel (which may be the 300-foot-long Raven tunnel) and ground in the Contact Group held in 1935 and 1937 by Roy Albin. George Lippincott of Goldfield, Nevada, acquired the mine from Walls by a lease agreement in 1942, later buying it outright in 1944.

In partnership with his sons, George, Jr., and Dick, Lippincott began development work in May 1942 on the Lead King. Eight men produced ore that was trucked to Goldfield and then shipped by train to smelters in Murray, Utah. The length of the route and difficulties encountered by the trucks passing over it necessitated the very selective mining of ore, with only that averaging between 40% and 63% lead and returning at least 35 ozs. of silver per ton being economically worthwhile. A new road to Keeler was in process of construction by the operators to make shipping from a claim carrying only 30% lead ore economically possible. This rough, steep route passed through the south end of Saline Valley and and met California State Route 190 near Darwin Junction.

During the second World War the Ubehebe area was utilized as a practice field for aerial gunnery exercises. by the U.S. Government, thereby causing the temporary cessation of mining activity there. By 1946 Lippincott's Southern Lead Company had resumed operations and with a nine-man crew was producing two carloads of lead weekly, which were again being shipped to Goldfield. Lippincott's son George, Jr., was mine superintendent. The mine was still producing in 1951 when it was described as consisting of twelve unpatented claims whose workings included a main tunnel (portions of which antedated Lippincott's acquisition of the property) 100 feet west of the mine camp on the hillside above and penetrating to a distance of 625 feet. Drifts and a sixty-foot winze provided access to the ore bodies. These particular workings had produced 1,000 tons of ore assaying 42% lead and 8 ozs. of silver. Other workings included the Confidence No. 2 tunnel, Taylor shaft, Johnson tunnel, and Addison shaft, and early in 1951 work had begun on the Inspiration shaft. So far 2,000 tons of ore assaying 25% to 40% lead, 11 to 38 ozs. of silver, 4% to 11% zinc, and valued a $80,000, had been shipped.

Although earlier the ore produced at the mine had been treated at custom plants in surrounding communities, the company in the early 1950s erected its own mill and blast furnace operation in Santa Ana, California, in the Bonnie Claire District sixty miles to the east. Here, especially during World War II, lead and silver were smelted for use in storage batteries. (The Lippincott Lead Company smelter closed down in 1953.) Equipment at the Lippincott Mine in 1951 included two diesel compressors, a Caterpillar bulldozer, a diesel light plant, and a camp occupied then by only three men. The most accessible water sources were Goldbelt Spring, twenty-six miles away, and Scotty's Castle, forty miles away. Big Dodd Spring was south a distance of only about 4-1/2 miles, but could only be reached by an arduous trail. Water was never piped to the camp from this spring because of the likelihood of the line freezing during the cold months of the year and the subsequent difficulties that would attend its maintenance. The Racetrack playa was used as a landing strip by the mine.

In 1974 George Lippincott, Jr.'s, Polaris Battery Company, Inc., was planning further exploratory work on the Lippincott mining group, formally consisting now of the Lead King, Lead King Mining Claim Nos. 1, 3, and 4, Lead King #5-#8, and the Lippincott Mill Site.Greene, 1981

Mineralization is a replacement deposit hosted in dolomite. Contempuraneous deposits of Cu, Fe, W & talc were formed in the dolomite by the intrusion of quartz monzonite stock. Lead deposits resemble pods and pipes in siliceous veins. The ore shoots have replaced dolomite along minor faults and brecciated zones. The ore body is podiform/pipe-like. Controls for ore emplacement included faults. Dolomite and overlying sedimentary rocks are folded into an inverted, overturned syncline which becomes a fault toward the E. Another fault nearly parallels the western margin, and intersects a NW-trending shear zone. Local rocks include Devonian marine rocks, unit 1 (Death Valley) and/or Quaternary alluvium and marine deposits.

Local geologic structures include faults and folds.

Workings include underground openings comprised of a main tunnel 625 feet long at an altitude of 3,750 feet, driven S45W. A drift runs 50 feet SE. The pipe-like ore body, which plunges N70W, was mined to surface. A tunnel was driven S17W for 145 feet on the Confidence No. 2. A 40 foot deep winze was sunk 75 feet from the portal of this tunnel. The Taylor shaft, inclined 65NW to a depth of 135 feet, follows an ore body 2 feet (0.61 meters) in width. The Addison shaft, at an altitude of 4,900 feet, accesses a 125 foot long ore body inclined 40NW.

Production information: 1,000 tons of ore was mined through the main tunnel from an ore body 6 inches to 14 feet wide, assaying 42% Pb and 8 ounces of Ag per ton. 50 tons of ore were mined from the No. 2 tunnel with 50 tons shipped. 400 tons of ore were mined through the TAylor shaft with 400 tons shipped, assaying 17 to 40% Pb, and the maximum Zn & Ag was 20% and 105 ounces Ag, respectively. $35,000 of ore was mined through the Addison shaft, with shipments assaying as much as 63% Pb and 36 ounces Ag/ton.

Assay data: Year: 1951 (period = 1951): Ore (estimated): Ag - 720 grams/metric ton; Pb - 33 weight per cent; Zn - 8 weight per cent.

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Link to USGS MRDS:	10076628

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References