Description

Bullwhacker Mine, Lynx Creek, Yavapai County, Arizona Territory, c. 1891.

Photograph of men building the headframe at the Bullwhacker Mine, c. 1891, atop Bullwacker Hill, that was located about four miles northeast of Prescott, Arizona.

A “bullwhacker” was the name given to the lead driver of a team of oxen in the early West; the naming referred to the act of whacking bulls or oxen to keep them in order and working together as a “team” as wagons were driven west.

The Bullwhacker Mine, also referred to as the Prospect or Lode, was a gold mine located in Yavapai County, Arizona at an elevation of 5,699 feet. Its beginnings are said to have been in 1876 was first located by two prospectors with the names of Gudgeon and Ware. The mine was opened and closed many times in its’ history and changed hands many times as well. The mine was said to have produced between $50,000 to $100,000 during its operational lifespan.

In 1898, this posit was described as “A small mine . . . notable for bearing coarse gold of high grade in a small quartz vein. The vein varies in thickness from a few inches to a foot. The quartz is hard and occurs in boulder-like masses, rounded hard lumps, in which the gold occurs. There is apparently one ore chute or chimney pitching northward. The claim has been worked to a depth of 132 feet by a shaft and most of the pay ore extracted (1886) to that depth.”

The Bullwhacker Mine, and the Hill itself, was leveled and re-shaped when the Prescott Gateway Mall was built.