An Interview with Jack Flanagan - University of Nevada, Reno

Miner
An Interview with Jack Flanagan:
A Contribution to a Survey of
Life and Structures on the Comstock
Interviewer: Ann Harvey
Copyright 1984
University of Nevada Oral History Program
Mail Stop 0324
Reno, Nevada 89557
unohp@unr.edu
http://www.unr.edu/oralhistory
All rights reserved. Published 1984.
Printed in the United States of America
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Director: R.T. King
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On his Family’s migration west:
When did your grandfather come to Virginia City
Barney Flanagan came out here with his brother, Jim, on the completion of the V & T [Virginia &
Truckee] Railroad, prior to 1880; they both worked on the V & T Railroad. The V & T was completed in
1869, so it was about that time About that time. [My grandfather] was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and
moved up to Cincinnati, Ohio, when he was 15 years old. In Ohio he worked on the B & O [Baltimore &
Ohio] Railroad as a fireman. Then from Ohio he moved out to Virginia City at the request of his brother
to become an engineer on the V & T Railroad. He was 18 years old at the time. (Page 1)
On his father’s style of mining:
You see, sometimes miners stayed a long time at one mine, and at other times they moved around. They
would work here for a while; then they would take off and go down to work in the mines in Tonopah.
[When] they would get tired of that they would come back here and work the mines in Virginia City.
[Then] they would get tired of that and go on up to Butte, Montana. Pretty soon you would see them
back here in Virginia City again. They had a circuit that they worked back and forth between those 3
towns. They gave them the name “tramp miners.” (Page 5)
On his time as a miner:
It was a routine job. You did the same thing day after day. If you were working in a stope the first thing
you did when you went into the stope was remove the ore that the shift before had blasted. Then you
would start in and put up your square-set timbers and make them real secure. Next you would get out
your jackhammer or your stoper—whichever was needed at the time—and put in your round of holes,
load the holes with powder, get out of the stope in a hurry and blast. [laughter] If you were a station
tender your job all of the time was to load the cars on the cage. If you were a motorman you were the
one on the surface who took the cars and hauled them by the motor out to the mill. It was a routine job.
There was one advantage to working underground. No matter how cold it was on the surface you always
knew when you went down there you would be working in a warm place. some parts of the mine were
cool on account of their ventilation, but most of the mines were warm no matter what kind of a blizzard
was on the surface.
How much were the miners paid in the 1930s
We were paid $4.50 a day. (Page 23)

Jack Flanagan