The founding of Oracle, Arizona

By Robert Zucker
This is a chapter from "Treasures of the Santa Catalina Mountains."

Canadian prospector Albert Weldon made a trip around South America aboard his uncle’s ship the Oracle to the deserts of southwestern United States [1] in 1877. [2]

His journey brought him to Tucson where he joined with James Lee, from Ireland, and Alexander McKay, from Scotland, to prospect for gold and silver on the north side of the Santa Catalina Mountains. They found that– and more.

Shortly after his arrival, Weldon staked a claim for the Oracle mine in 1877. He named it after the ship that brought him around Cape Horn to the U.S.

That next year Weldon told McKay how to get out to the mine and the natural spring just above it. [3] [4] [5] Eventually, Oracle would become the name of the new community north of Tucson.

In 1878 with two burros McKay ventured alone from Tucson into the northern slope of the Catalina Mountains and encountered Indians. McKay said one Indian approached and called himself, “George, Eskiminzin’s man. [6] Eskimizin was the notorious Apache chief. He warned McKay that Eskimizin and other men were coming. They did show up, with women and children, and asked for flour. They camped nearby a nervous McKay that night. [7] One story relates that it was an Indian who told McKay about minerals in the area.

In May, 1878, Lee and Charles Franklin made a discovery of free gold while Lee was building a road to the pine timber in the mountains. The ore is “full of free gold and is reported to be very plentiful– judged by the surface prospects.” [8] 

After some other prospecting that November, 1878, Albert Weldon sold two hundred feet of his claim, the Exchequer Mine, to C.H. Wheeler and A.J. Doran for $100. [9]

The next month Lee was still collecting “large quantities of decomposed quartz, gold predominating.” Tucson pioneer Samuel Hughes staked the Esperanza Mine nearby after assays from the ore were into the “thousands.” [10]

On Christmas Day 1878, Weldon and his partner McKay located some ore and made a claim to the Christmas gold mine. Then one week later, on New Year’s Day 1879, they staked a claim for the New Years mine, just north of the Christmas. Both mines were located within the present day town of Oracle. [11]

Nearby, Weldon began a bush mining camp, called Weldon’s Camp, [12] that had an abundant supply of timber and water available. A spring soon to be used as a grotto was included. [13] A tri-weekly stage brought mail from Tucson to the camp.

A year later in November, 1879, Lee and others discovered a ledge of mineralized rock. An assay of part of the stone returned $80.43 in silver and $201.50 in gold. [14] Along with the new residents, came stories of even greater riches hidden in the mountains.

In 1879 McKay said he built the first house in Oracle. It was a one-room adobe for Weldon and himself. [15] [16] Another account credits James Lee with constructing the first permanent house. [17]

The Oracle mining property, now owned by Lee and Mayor Robert Leatherwood, was on the same ledge and south of the Christmas mine. It had a fifty foot shaft, but no work was being conducted. The purchasing parties forfeited their $40,000 bond. The nearby Christmas Mine, owned by McKay, Weldon & Co., had a sixty foot shaft in a four-foot vein of gold quartz.

One report said that James Lee had “grubstaked” one of Weldon’s mines. Lee purchased the mines of Weldon & Co. in March, 1880. [18] Both Weldon and Lee together struck a rich load in the Lee Mine, on the ledge near the Summit House, a month earlier. [19]

The Christmas Mine, owned by McKay, Weldon & Co., held a four-foot vein of gold quartz, but they tapped into an underground stream and struck water at forty feet deep and flooded the shaft. They abandoned the dig. Instead McKay laid a four-and-a-half mile pipe down the mountainside, built a house on the mesa, and started a sheep ranch. [20]

An excavation into solid rock about twelve by twenty feet provided cold, clear water from the natural flowing spring at Weldon’s Grotto. When U.S. Mineral Surveyor Solomon Allis and Mayor Leatherwood made a tour of the mines and camp, they noted seeing ruins on the southern summits of the Catarinas.  [21]

Lee and Leatherwood owned the Oracle claim but in a possible misprint or confusion of spelling, the local newspaper reported that the ‘Oricle’ (sic) claim in the Santa Catarinas was sold in April, 1880, by James Lee and Mayor Leatherwood. The newspaper may have meant the Oracle claim. The buyers, unnamed eastern capitalists, reportedly paid $100,000. The croppings were ten to forty feet wide, and assays showed from $50 to $1,400 per ton. [22]

That summer a successful Wily Box sold his mine of the same name– an extension of the Oracle claim– for several thousands of dollars. [23]

In February, 1881, Peter Loss was appointed postmaster in Tucson and James Bronson was appointed postmaster in Oracle. [24] [25]

By the fall of 1881, at least eight operating mining claims were operating in the area– the Oracle, Christmas, Merrimac, Valleco, [26] Tiger, Fashion, Gypsy, and the Mexican. [27] The Richardson Mining Company of New York purchased the nearby American Flag mine, and the Oracle camp, in early 1881 for $100,000 and had forty men at work. [28] That year Frank Shultz first located the nearby Mammoth Mine. [29]

Weldon eventually sold one-third of the Christmas mine and other Old Hat mines to McKay in May, 1881, for $2,000. [30] [31]

A second shaft in the Oracle was sunk in August and the prospects looked promising, according to Prof. Cooke, the Superintendent of the Oracle and American Flag Mines.  [32] Another lucky strike in the Oracle was made in mid-October during the night shift. The soft chunky rock was estimated to contain $20 per ton in gold and silver. [33]

Besides the haul taken from the mines, smart miners bonded or sold their property while the values were still high.