Discovery of Lead

    Another product of early Iowa was lead. According to a tradition an Indian woman in 1780 had discovered lead ores in the bluffs where Dubuque now stands. But recent study has proved that the Fox Indians knew about these deposits long before and actually mined the ores and reduced them to lead to be used especially for bullets. Little, however, was done until Julien Dubuque took over the mines in 1788.

Julien Dubuque

    The birthplace of Julien Dubuque was a little village in Canada not far from Quebec. He attended the parochial schools of his native village, and, like so many other of the French Canadians, went West at an early age. In 1785 he was in Wisconsin at Prairie du Chien, a frontier town on the banks of the Mississippi, east of McGregor in Iowa. Hearing of lead mines in Iowa, and being con-....

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.... vinced that a fortune might be made there, he obtained the right of settlement and mining from the Fox braves and chiefs, on a tract of land running 21 miles along the Mississippi and 9 miles west, including the mines operated by the Indians.

    On this tract Dubuque laid our farms and built houses and fences. He was "lord of all that he surveyed." Voyagers on the Mississippi often stopped at the mines. On such occasions salutes of welcome would be fired. Among the famous visitors at the mines were Schoolcraft, Catlin, Le Sueur, Beltrami, and Pike. The first two were noted students of Indian life.

    Dubuque was a farmer, a fur trader, and a miner. He was known in St. Louis as the biggest trader of the Upper Mississippi. But he was not a successful business man, for he bought so much on credit that he couldn't pay his debts.

Dubuque's Tower

To satisfy his creditors he turned over a part of his estate to them. Even this proved a bad bargain for the creditors, since it was found out after his death, that he had leased the land rather than purchased it.

    Among the Indians, Dubuque was known as Little Cloud because of his small stature and black hair. They respected and revered him and even thought him to be a great magician. To make them fear him, he once threatened to burn the water in Catfish creek. The threat was carried out by pouring oil on the creek and setting this on fire as it flowed by the Indian village. The blaze so frightened the villagers, that they were more ready to do his bidding.

    When little Cloud died suddenly of pneumonia, there was great lamentation among the Indians. They all followed him to his grave where the Indian chiefs spoke eloquently of their love and admira-....

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.... tion for him. On the cedar cross marking the grave was written: Julien Dubuque, Miner of the Mines of Spain, died March 24th, 1810, aged 45 years and 6 months. Actually he was about three years older. A Fox chief and Dubuque's Indian wife were buried close by. The graves are now marked by a memorial tower.

The Mines of Spain

    To please the Spaniards, Dubuque named the lead mines the Mines of Spain. He brought in French Canadians to act as overseers of the Indian workers- boys, old men and women. The workers loosened the ore with picks and crowbars, put it into bags or baskets, and carried it out through sloping tunnels. In smelting the ore by very crude methods only about half of the metal was extracted. The annual output of metal was between 20,000 and 40,000 pounds.

    For many years after the death of Dubuque, the Indians worked the mines themselves and refused to lease them to white men. The ore, however, was sold to white traders who had a smeltery on an island in the Mississippi. Finally in 1830, the Langworthy brothers obtained the right to operate the lead mines. Better methods were introduced and the value to the product increased until it reached a million dollars a year. A frontier town grew up around the lead "diggings," which was named Dubuque, the first permanent white settler in Iowa, and the miner of the Mines of Spain.

    The "diggings" were not only rough but tough. So was the frontier often everywhere. A writer on early Iowa refers to the "diggings" as a place that could not be called civilized. It had certain dubious honors. Here the first murder rising to the dignity of public attention, had occurred; and also the first hanging in a "Christian-like" manner.

    However, before long Dubuque redeemed itself. Before the Civil War, it was the leading city in Iowa, rated for its factories, schools and churches, and its upright and progressive people.

Questions and Exercises: What is a tradition? Compare parochial school with public school. Fine our more about Schoolcraft. How does ore differ from metal? How many tons of lead were produced annually by Dubuque?