EPA’s attention to cultural resource management issues during the Elizabeth Mine cleanup resulted in a well-documented site history that fulfilled the desires of the community and the State of Vermont, and in some instances also positively informed aspects of cleanup design and construction. To satisfy the project’s public education requirement, EPA hired Milestone Heritage Consulting to create From Copperas to Cleanup: The History of Vermont’s Elizabeth Copper Mine, a popular history report presenting the story of 150 years of industrial activity and how EPA and its project partners documented and reclaimed its legacy on the landscape. The mine cleanup educational mitigation also includes a series of on-site interpretive panels for a mine history trail. Copies of From Copperas to Cleanup are available from Milestone Heritage Consulting at: www.milestoneheritage.com

1. A Mine is a Terrible Thing to Waste:
Cultural Resources
and
Vermont’s Elizabeth Mine
Superfund Cleanup
Matt Kierstead

2. Mining Landscapes
Callahan Mine (Cu/Pb/Zn/Ag)
Harborside, ME 1968-1972

3. Mining Landscapes
Elizabeth Mine (Copperas, Copper)
South Strafford, VT 1809-1958

4. Anaconda, Montana
Anaconda Copper Mining Co., 585 ft tall Washoe Reduction
Works Smelter Stack, 1919; world’s tallest masonry
structure

5. New
England
Mining
History &
AMD

6. The
Elizabeth
Mine

7. Vermont’s
Extractive
Industries

8. Vermont’s
Orange County
“Copper Belt”
Mines:
Pike Hill Mines
1846-1919
Ely Mine
1853-1918
Elizabeth Mine
1809-1958

10. The
Elizabeth
Mine
Site
South
Strafford,
Vermont

11. Copperas (Iron Sulfate) Crystals

12. The Copperas Works

13. Making
Copperas
at
Copperas Hill
1809-1882

14. Copperas Boiler

15. Isaac Tyson, Jr.
1792-1861
Chalcopyrite from
Elizabeth Mine

16. James Tyson
1832-1900
Elizabeth Tyson
1828-1888

17. Tyson
No.1 Shaft,
1880s
Tyson
Smelter,
about
1902

18. August Heckscher and his
1908 Copper Smelter

19. Elizabeth Miners, World War II

20. 1942 Ore Concentration Mill
Miners Posing Underground

21. 1950s
Operations

22. Flotation Tailings Pile
and
Disposal Launders

23. Mid-1950s:
“Boom to Bust”

24. Copperas Works Roast Beds and Heap Leach Piles

25. Lower Copperas Factory Foundation, Mine Road

26. Acid Mine Drainage
and
Ompompanoosuc
River

27. RECLAMATION: Tailings
Grading; Leachate Treatment
Plant and Diversion Channel

28. Mine Waste
Removal
Waste Cover
Construction

29. Cleanup Success

30. EPA CERCLA
TCRA
EMCAG, SHS, Etc.
NTCRA
SECTION 106 NHPA
VT DHP (SHPO)
CRM
NRHP DOE
MOA
MITIGATION

31. MITIGATION:
-DOCUMENTATION
-ARCHAEOLOGY
-PRESERVATION
-EDUCATION

32. DOCUMENTATION:
Historic American
Engineering Record
(HAER):
Narrative History
Report

33. DOCUMENTATION:
HAER:
Large-Format Archival
Photographs

34. DOCUMENTATION: HAER: Drawings

35. HAER: Site History and Layout

36. HAER: Mine Surface Plant

37. HAER: Underground Workings

38. HAER: Process Drawing

39. MITIGATION:
ARCHAEOLOGY
Data Recovery

40. Copperas Factory:
BOILER

41. Copperas Factory: COOLER

42. Copperas Factory: CRYSTALLIZER

43. Copperas Factory:
ARTIFACTS

44. MITIGATION:
PRESERVATION
Copperas
Factory
Foundations

45. MITIGATION:
PRESERVATION
Ore
Concentration
Mill
Foundations

46. MITIGATION: EDUCATION
Popular Report

47. MITIGATION:
EDUCATION
Interpretive
Panels

48. Copperas Works

49. Tailings Pile

53. St. Nicholas
Breaker, Manahoy
City, PA
Locust Summit
Breaker, Mt. Carmel,
PA

54. St. Nicholas Breaker

55. Outside Shamokin, PA

56. Anthracite Region Heritage Sites

58. Trevorton, PA

63. Mocanaqua, PA

64. Earth Conservancy
Mocanaqua Loop Trail

70. Stony Creek Granite
Quarry, Branford, CT

72. Berkley Pit, Butte, MT
Verde Antique Quarry,
Rochester, VT

73. Tonoma AMD Wetlands
Educational Site, Indiana, PA

74. “Big Muskie”

78. Q&A