Way Of Life Ends In Leadville
Decades before ski-slopes and resort towns, people came to the Colorado Mountains to take a gamble and make their fortune. This was mining country where gold and silver were king, and the Wild West was tamed. Leadville, Colorado was a boomtown, birthplace to an industry that built an entire state, reports CBS News Correspondent Byron Pitts.
Resident Bob Elder has deep roots in Leadville. His grandfather settled there in 1879. However, he says a lot has changed since then.
"My dad, when he was a small boy in the early 1900's, said that the people were very proud when the air was full of smoke. That meant the mines and the smelters were active," Elder says.
These days, the sky over Leadville is clear, because a century-old tradition is dying. It's a lifestyle men like Rich Tedesco still love.
"I worked in the mines from the time I graduated from high school," Tedesco recalls. "I got married, had kids and the mines treated me good, gave me a good wage and helped me raise my kids."
All that has changed now. Tedesco drilled for precious metals at the Black Cloud Mine in a town that was once home to 30 other mines just like it. By 1998, Black Cloud was the sole survivor. On Thursday, it was shut down.
It's a story reminiscent of the steel towns of Pennsylvania some two decades ago, and the mill towns of New England before that. As the American economy expands beyond its borders and shifts from one of manufacturing to information and technology, thousands of American workers are finding themselves left behind.
Sam McGeorge of the Black Cloud Mine says there are several factors involved in its demise.
"Two reasons: we're out of ore and the metals markets are so depressed that we cannot mine economically," McGeorge says.
Black Cloud was the largest private employer left in Leadville. Now, 125 people will lose their jobs and the local economy will lose an estimated $6 million a year.
But Tedesco says it gets even worse: there's no place for the unemployed to go.
"Small Town Leadville is Small Town Pennsylvania, is Small Town Georgia, is Small Town USA. We're all in the same boat," he says. "Not everybody grows up to be a Ph.D. There has to be some people in this world that dig a ditch and drive a truck and that can mine."
Tedesco speaks from experience. He used to make $25 an hour as a miner. Now, he makes half that working construction.
For Tedesco and many others in Leadville, losing the mine was more than just losing a good paycheck. They've lost a way of life.
"Mining's in my blood and it's in my heart and that's always what I'll be, whether that's what I'm doing for a living or not."