Description

Congress miners inside a drift, Martinez District, Yavapai County, Arizona. For light, the miners carried wax candles on a wire which they stuck in cracks in the walls of the mine.

Beginning in 1894 and continuing for more than a decade and a half, Congress was Arizona's premier gold camp, and ignited the enthusiasm for gold prospecting throughout central Arizona. 

Congress, and the Congress Mine, boomed in the 1890's with the arrival of the railroad just a few miles away at Congress Junction. New investors poured money into the mine's infrastructure. The Congress mine, also nicknamed “Queen of the Hills,” became for a time one of Arizona's largest gold producers. An article in the December 22, 1897 edition of the Arizona Weekly Journal Miner boasted: “A visit to the Congress Mine would convince the most skeptical of the mineral resources of the southern part of the county. The pay roll at Congress embodies 425 men and this number is regularly employed. The present mines have plenty of gold in sight…” A population of 2000 supported a number of saloons, stores, theatres, schools and professional offices.

During the 1950’s, after the mine shut down, the town didn't last long and the post office was moved to the railroad hub at Congress Junction. Leasers perodically worked the many tailings for the next thirty years. Traces of wooden buildings, foundations and numerous huge white and pink tailings' dumps remain. Today, the town known as "Congress" is actually old Congress Junction, and little remains of the original town site.