On September 9, 1889, water broke into the White Ash Mine beneath Clear Creek at the west end of 12th Street and roared down to levels as deep as 730 feet, flooding at a rate of 85,000 gallons a day until an estimated three million cubic feet of water had filled the shafts. Ten miners lost their lives: David L. Lloyd, William and John Collins, Richard Rowe, Joseph Allen, Joseph Hutter, Henry Haussman, William F. Bowden, and Jack Morgan. Golden’s most prosperous coal mine, in operation since 1867, could not be salvaged, and the victims’ bodies were not recovered. Mines beneath Clear Creek had long suffered from water seepage, and in 1879 the Black Diamond Mine north of the White Ash Mine was abandoned for that reason. Water from the Black Diamond Mine burst into the White Ash through a seam weakened by an earlier mine fire. The White Ash Mine’s name lived on in three other area mines, and the original had been named for the ash left after its coal was burned.

Fairmount, Colorado · USA