employees

Employees

High level staff included:

Manager

Click to learn about two of the managers

Assistant manager
Superintendent of the metallurgical (the science of separating metals from their ores) dept.
Engineer
Chief clerk (ordered materials and supplies)
Accountant
Weigh master

Technicians:
Assayers, stationery engineers, blacksmiths

These positions, plus the foremen, supervised approx. 200 men.

Manual labor positions:

Unloading rail cars
Transporting ore and fuels around the smelter using wheelbarrows on tramways

Rabbling roasting ores (a tool or mechanically operated device used for stirring or mixing a charge in a roasting furnace).

Loading charges into blast furnaces
Dumping slag pots
Cleaning out hearths, flues and dust chambers
Support staff at the boardinghouse

Pay ranged from $1.75-$4.00/day, which today is the equivalent of $38.00- $87.00/day.

In 1896, there were approximately 150 men employed at the silver smelter. But turnover was high, which could be attributed to:

*Exhausting and difficult work
*10-12 hour work days
*Operation fluctuations
*Extreme heat during the summer months, which made working in the roaster and blast furnace houses even hotter than usual.

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