Black Hills Mine

[josh bernhard]

I just returned from a trip to the Black Hills to see the usual suspects (Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Lead, etc.). One night was spent just outside of Keystone at Kemp's Camp, where I was surprised (then again, not really) to find an open mine tunnel in the mountainside above it.





It took me a while to figure out what it was, owing to the fact that it is old enough for trees to be growing on the tailings, and a thick carpet of pine needles covered the whole place. Regardless, there was plenty to indicate that this was a mine, including the foundation of a tiny structure seen in the lower left corner of this picture:



Unfortunately I was unable to go inside for lack of preparation and proper equipment; It would be interesting to see what's inside. A little snooping around in the area uncovered a second tunnel that had collapsed, about twenty feet above and thirty to the left of the opening. Does anybody else known anything about this mine?

To finish this off, here's a bolt and nut that was sitting close to the foundation:



A few more pictures can be found here: http://mojaveunderground.com/forum/album.php?albumid=6

[BlackHills]

Hi Josh,
I will do a little snooping and see if i can turn anything up for ya, you said this mine was near kemps camp? How close to it was the mine and in what direction, it will help with finding a name or other info as keystone is riddled with mines. I might add this one to the top of my list and bring some gear to look in the tunnel

Jonathan

[josh bernhard]

location

Hi Josh,
I will do a little snooping and see if i can turn anything up for ya, you said this mine was near kemps camp? How close to it was the mine and in what direction, it will help with finding a name or other info as keystone is riddled with mines. I might add this one to the top of my list and bring some gear to look in the tunnel

Jonathan

Just rechecked my maps, I'm never very prepared on family vacations and I had no idea which way was North...

The mine is on the north side of the canyon, at the very east end of Kemp's and across the stream.

Google Map here:

http://maps.google.com/maps?ie=UTF8&q=keystone+south+dakota&hq=&hnear=Keystone,+Pennington,+South+Dakota&t=h&ll=43.900544,-103.442776&spn=0.002934,0.006947&z=18

It's in the trees between the house on the right and the bottom of the RV spots at Kemp's. Hope this helps.

-Joshua

[BlackHills]

Hi Josh,

Im not finding anything regardiong that mine in my stash of info, but judging from the photos its probably from the late 1880's-1900 time frame. Thanks for the info regarding its location I am hoping to make it up on my day of this week with a friend and getting some photos and might poke our heads inside. BTW I dont know if you knew this or not but almost directly north west of Kemps Kamp is the Bob ingersoll mine up on the mountain (If you look on google earth its the big blue building up there) There are some photos of it in my Black Hills mines thread

Jonathan

[DonaM]

Hi Josh,
I'm the daughter of a mining engineer who spent his career in the Black Hills. I remember visiting the November Mine with him and picking up chuncks of beryl. I was looking for the location of the November Mine and delighted to see your pictures. I don't remember how to get to the NOvemeber mine site. Let me know if you can provide directions.
DonaM