I was reading a biography of the famous Boston mayor , James Curley. The man was a well known politician, and people both loved and hated him.
One thing I saw that interested me…sometime in the late 1930’s, Curley bought an abandoned silver mine in Nevada. Evidently, he was swindled, as the mine never paid off for him-he lost over $1 million on the deal.
My question: what happens to mining claims that are abandoned? As far as I know, no one ever took over the mine after Curley.
If there are any Nevada dopers, how would I go about investigating the subsequent ownership (if any) of this mine?
The county in which the claim is located is the holder of all the records that pertain. You should be able to access ownership records back to day one through the county land office or assessor’s office. Notice I said should be able to. If you’ve ever tried to wade through county records, especially in the rural counties, you’ll understand that it’s not always easy or convenient. If the claim is located on federal or state land, the agency that controls the land is supposed to have duplicate records, but in my experience, they’re usually less reliable and up-to-date than the county’s.
Also, even if a claim is abandoned, the previous owner may still have a legitimate title to improvements left there. I found this out some years ago when trying to salvage scrap iron from an abandoned mine. The previous claimant was still able to prove ownership of the equipment left behind, and I was forced to settle with him, which pretty much ate up any profit from the venture.
SS
This is accurate - the only thing I would add, is that if the claimant is deceased there is a statute of limitations on how long they [or their trust, unless edited in their will] have before another can legally purchase the claim. Here in Colorado, our neighbor is a full time miner and aside from having some really cool old mining equipment in his yard, he’s a wealth of knowledge on how to reclaim abandoned or out of date claims. Looking at his house and the things in it, he’d done quite well over the years.
When you say abandoned, it could still be owned by a large mining conglomerate or next-of-kin. If taxes have been unpaid for mineral rights, it could have been bought as a tax deed or lien (Your state may vary but as an example Colorado is a tax lein state and the mineral rights could be severed from the parcel) and the claim may be lost. Also, the claim may be on BLM land and if not renewed, it could belong to the Feds.
What county are you in?
I know that some of that information is online in my state, although it’s hidden away in some near-impossible to find state website. Maybe some poking around in the Nevada bureau of minerals might turn it up.
However, just plugging in “James Curley Nevada” into google brought up a book that describes the history of the ghost town where the mine was located: http://books.google.com/books?id=6mL12N7yhgwC&pg=PA40&lpg=PA40&dq=james+curley+nevada&source=bl&ots=K5wj30zQC6&sig=Sui46y-UfGmLRfYo5VfU6kLOQv8&hl=en&ei=hlrYTI3wH4O8sAO67-SMCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&sqi=2&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=james%20curley%20nevada&f=false
It sounds like there was actually some active mining going on at or near the site at least as late as the 1990’s. It seems like there was semi-continuous prospecting and mining in the town from when Curley was working it in the 30’s and 40’s through the present (small-scale mercury mining and uranium prospecting), so it seems like at least some people thought enough of the area to maintain their claims. I would speculate that Curley probably would have been able to sell his claim if he wanted to, albeit maybe for next to nothing. The current owners are probably one of those big mining companies working the area now, though the chain of ownership between Curley and them (and whether it includes an abandonment) might be hard to reconstruct.