Map of Mining Claims, Butte and Vicinity, Montana

Butte, Montana: Harper, MacDonald & Co., 1916. Hardcover. Very good. Color lithographic map of mining claims near Butte, Montana, measuring 37" x 49" when opened. Map is glued onto linen and bound in red cloth hardcover with gilt text. Binding with moderate wear to extremities with some material loss and closed tears. Maps has light edge wear, as well as multiple closed tears at creases (stabilized by linen backing), and faint stain on verso along one fold. One set of claims -- for the Blue Bird silver mine, discovered in 1881 -- marked in orange crayon.Butte was known as "The Richest Hill on Earth" for mines that made fortunes for Copper Kings Marcus Daly, William A. Clark and F. Augustus Heinz. The city's rich history includes a stint as a hotbed of socialist activism, home to a thriving Chinese community whose members came to work in the mines, and scene of some of the most deadly mine disasters in U.S. history (including the Pennsylvania Mine Fire, which killed 21 men the year this map was published).