Grant H. Smith The History of the Comstock Lode 1850-1920, Geology and Mining Series No. 37, University of Nevada Bulletin: Reno, Nevada, vol. XXXVII. 1 July 1943, no. 3, (revised 1966), Ninth printing, 1980. 305 pp.
Foreword:
[p. xi] "The Comstock Lode is nationally famous for its huge output of gold and silver . . .
"The Comstock, with this glorious history as one of the world's greatest mining camps and producers of the precious metals, will always attract mining capital searching for low-grade ores or bonanzas. The Nevada Bureau of Mines and the Mackay School of Mines . . .
. . . there has been lacking a comprehensive, chronological mining history of the Lode, extending over a half century with a progressive record of the development work carrried out, the failures encountered, the bonanzas discovered, and the production records of the mines . . .
"The late John A. Fulton, as director of the Bureau, over ten years ago, sought an author qualified to write a mining history of the Comstock Lode, who was qualified by both his life experience and his interest in the Lode to write such a history.
"Such a person was Grant H. Smith, a mining attorney of San Francisco. His youth was spent on the Comstock in the bonanza days as an inquisitive youngster and young miner; then he taught school and studied law and was admitted to practice by the Supreme Court of Nevada in January 1890. His later life has been in close contact with the Comstock as attorney for a number of the mines. Being a man trained in collecting and analyzing facts, along with the strong interest and perception in the historical events that stirred men's beings and brought out both the heroic and base in their characters, he brought also to this work [p. xii] the judgment of mature years and an unflagging search for source material.
[p. xii] "Ten years of research brought forth a voluminous manuscript covering not only the mining history, but also that of political and social history, and particularly the life history of the Comstock's outstanding character, John W. Mackay.
"The present director of the Bureau . . . prevailed upon Mr. Smith to take from his manuscript that mining material most suited for a Bureau bulletin, and with the aid and advice of the Director to rewrite it in the form of this bulletin.
"Enough of the absorbing personal histories of the prominent men of the Lode has been retained along with many rare illustrations to entice the average citizen of Nevada to read and realize the importance of the Comstock and of the mining industry in the life of the State.
". . .
"During the last two years the Bureau with the aid of research by the Nevada State Writers Project of W.P.A., has compiled from the files of the old Comstock newspapers and written chronologically, the "Individual Histories of the Mines of the Comstock," fifty-six properties in all. This voluminous material is in typewritten form for consultation at the State Library in Carson City and in the Bureau's office at the Mackay School of Mines.
"In addition, there will be available at a future date as a gift to the Bureau, a detailed account of the operations of each of the principal mines covering hundreds of pages, compliled by Grant H. Smith in his research work.
"Within the last decade the United States Geological Survey has made a thorough restudy of the Comstock Lode, Dr. V.P. [p. xiii] Gianella of the Bureau aiding in the work. Due to the all-out war effort of the Survey, this new material remains unpublished.
"The Mackay School of Mines has in its library a large collection of books concerning the Comstock, in its museums on display an unrivaled collection of Comstock ores and historical relics, and in its files, a great accumultion of maps, company reports, and correspondence files.
- Jay A. Carpenter, Director. [1943]
[Grant H. Smith, in 1943, writes:]
". . .
[p. 236] "The majority of people with families lived well, but simply. Unmarried miners and other single men boarded at the many restaurants, which provided excellent fare at $30 to $35 a month. The cost of living was less than it is today; some of the items were higher, others lower. The smallest piece of money was a silver dime, ten cents, which was the price of a small basket of strawberries in season. The only money in circulation was gold and silver, although in the East they had nothing but paper currency until after the resumption of specie payments in 1879.
"Frontier life teaches men to think for themselves. This was especially true of early mining camp life in California and Nevada. The philosophy of life of the pioneers was largely the result of observation and experience. There was little dependence upon Divine Providence-men had learned to rely upon themselves. Their religion was a sort of golden rule. They encouraged and supported churches because of their influence upon the community. Ingersoll expressed their views about the Bible, and the Darwinian theory appealed to their intelligence. The mechanistic theory of the universe appeared to them as the only reasonable explanation. Man himself was only a machine, born to function according to his gifts; some fearfully and wonderfully made; others mere automatons, with many gradations between. The Comstock was a laboratory of life, in which it appeared that all men are born unequal. All of the races of the world were [p. 237] there and all types of men and women, from the highest to the lowest. One learned more of the human animal in a few years in that congested community than could be acquired in a lifetime in a conventional town.
"The average intelligence was higher in the early '60s than in the '70s when the foreign-born came in increasing numbers, although the highly intelligent members of the community maintained their standards; they read the best literature, were exceedingly well informed on all of the topics of the times, and were engaging conversationalists.
". . . the outstanding men of those times seemed "bigger" than those of today. That was equally true in San Francisco. The explanation appears to be that they were the product of pioneer conditions, which brought out the best as well as the worst. Men are made by struggle."