Item #27973 [ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba. Juragua Iron Company.
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba
Cuban iron mine owned by American concern

[ Mining, CUBA ] Photograph archive (28 large images) from Juragua Iron Company, Santiago de Cuba

[ no place ]: [ Juragua Iron Company ? ] c1900. First Edition. A great archive of photographs of a mining camp and surrounding areas in Santiago de Cuba. 16 smaller images (7 x 10 inch mounts), 12 larger (11 x 9 inch mounts). (we're including one other that is on a very damaged mount). Tonality is generally very good, with a few images very light (or damaged). The images are albumen photographs, circa 1900 we'd guess by the mounts. General wear at the corners of the mounts, but overall very nice. Very Good. [27973]


An unusual grouping of photographs from Santiago de Cuba, showing a mining camp and operations (by Juragua Iron Company) and some of the surrounding area. Six images are what we'd consider the surrounding area, one marked "Typical Rural Home", another "Cuban Private School", two city views, and several local scenery. The balance are either directly related to mine operations or the railroad that supports it. Several of railroad depots or stops, one labeled "Spanish Barracks", a nice grouping showing mining buildings on the hillside (typically with the railroad at the base of the hill), and a final grouping of core mining operations showing tracks down the side of the hill, terminating with the railroad and scaffolding that allows placing the ore out of buckets and into cars on the track.

Determining the location was the hardest part, as few of the images have any markings, and there are few identifiers in the photographs themselves that are unique. The first major clue was a photograph marked "View of Santiago from the Lawn of Gen. ?? ??" showing a view off in the distance of a city. "Cuban Private School" moved us to Santiago de Cuba. The mine was more difficult, finally we were able to distinguish on several of the railroad images the letters "J. I. Co". The final piece of the puzzle was a book "Industrial Cuba, by Robert P. Porter" which contains several of the same images in this grouping, and confirmed the mine name as Juragua Iron Company (J. I. Co).

Lehigh University in PA holds in their collections a scrapbook of this company. They note "The Juragua Iron Company was the first American company to become interested in iron mining in Cuba. The mines were located in the province of Santiago at the eastern edge of Cuba...The company first went to Cuba in the early 1880s to begin iron ore mining. Its capital lstock was controlled by the Bethlehem Steel Company of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. It shipped its first iron ore from Cuba in 1884. The company was the most successful of the American iron mining companies operating in Cuba in the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth centuries."

A rare opportunity to purchase a Cuban mining archive owned by an American concern.

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