They Planned to Pull Iron Out of Columbia River Sand
A Hanford inventor and the Great Western Iron Company claimed the Columbia Valley's sand held high-grade magnetite worth $90 a ton.
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While the gas and oil men were hoping for rich strikes in the depths of Benton county, the county's iron men were just as confident that they were going to make a big clean-up on the surface. T. E. Kamerer, of Hanford, one of the incorporators of the Great Western Iron company, was in town this week. He said material for their iron machine had been ordered in the east and they expected to soon begin its construction. The machine, the invention of Mr. Kamerer and his associates, is designed to separate iron from the sands of the Columbia river valley. Mr. Kamerer carried with him a small jar of iron particles which had been taken from the sand by the crude model of the new invention. Several assays have been made of the iron and each time it has been pronounced high-grade magnetite iron, practically free from any foreign matter. This is the iron which is used in the manufacture of steel and is worth $90 a ton.
The machine which the company will build will be equipped with 6,000 magnets for separating the iron in the sand. Assays from the company's holdings show that the percentage of iron runs from 1 to 4 percent. Kamerer says that working with the lowest grade sand two men will be able to take out three tons of iron a day. The company plans to install a smelting equipment for melting the iron into pigs and to transport it on the river.
“"Several assays have been made of the iron and each time it has been pronounced high-grade magnetite iron, practically free from any foreign matter. This is the iron which is used in the manufacture of steel and is worth $90 a ton."”
The dream of extracting valuable metal from ordinary Columbia Basin sand never became the industry these men imagined, though the region's mineral ambitions would reappear with later schemes. It is a reminder that booms are often built on a single assay and a salesman's jar of samples. The Great Western Iron Company is long forgotten; the sand is still here.
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