The Humming Bird Mining Company was organized in 1898 and included a total of fifteen claims. Some of these were the Bombard, Blue Jay, Tomahawk, Philippine, Fairmont, Commercial, Wedge Faction, Mountain View, Summit, No Count, Josie, Aetna, and Phoenix. Humming Bird was located very near the town of Burke, Idaho, in the Lelande mining district. The principal ores extracted were lead, silver, and zinc.
The main stockholder in the early days of the Humming Bird was the owner, Carl Amonson, who traded a total of 400,000 shares for rights to all of the claims. The first board of directors, elected in 1898, were Carl Amonson, president and manager; M.J. Maher, vice president; M.J. Farrell, secretary; and Walter Graham, treasurer. Dan Cardoner, a Burke merchant, later became the largest stockholder acquiring 250,000 shares between 1898 and 1899. By 1905, he owned 45% of the issued stock. He served on the board of directors from 1902 to 1911.
The Humming Bird became of great interest to the Day family when they realized that the mine's tunnel was aimed almost directly at the Hercules' orebody. The Hercules was just uphill from the Humming Bird, and Harry Day saw a chance to renovate and extend the tunnel--thus opening up a 5th level to the Hercules. Partners in the Hercules began buying up Humming Bird stock, gaining a majority by 1908. In 1909 the Hercules began work on tunnel #5.
In 1911 Harry Day became president of the board. The Humming Bird and the Hercules remained connected, physically and corporately, from then on. The Hercules acquired 97% of the stock in the 1930s and finally, in 1936, purchased all property associated with the mine and dissolved the company.
The records of the Humming Bird Mining Company span the years 1898 to 1936. Included are minutes of meetings, monthly and yearly financial statements, maps, claims, leases, deeds, correspondence with suppliers and stockholders, reports to state and federal agencies, stock ledgers, assessment records, cash journals, invoices, check registers, bank statements, paid checks, and federal and state tax returns.
Related materials can be found in the records of the Hercules Mining Company and the papers of Henry Day.
This Manuscript Group is divided into six series. The first series, Records of the Board of Directors and the Stockholders, includes a minute book and three folders of records relating to meetings, covering 1898-1936. Four folders of financial statements, 1921-1931, include monthly and yearly statements and reports to the board, the stockholder, and the Hercules Mining Company.
General Correspondence and Related Records, the second series, contains lode claims, leases, deeds, and progress reports. Taken together these records document the Humming Bird properties and work thereupon. Several blueprint maps are present. Also in this series is correspondence with suppliers, including one folder of correspondence with the Pelton Water Wheel Company dealing with the purchase and operation of a generator in 1903-1904. Here, too, are a file of accident and mine operation surveys, and two files of annual reports and statements, 1909-1936.
The third series, Capital Stock Records, includes stock ledgers for the whole of the company's history, but no stock journals. There are cancelled stock certificates, 1901-1936, and assessment journals, 1900-1930. Assessment receipt registers were kept for assessments 3, 12, and 13, as these are not covered by the journals. Also included are two sets of correspondence with stockholders; one from the Humming Bird's Burke office, the other from its Wallace office. These overlap between 1925 and 1935, and contain like materials -- including letters from the same stockholders.
Most of the items in Financial Records, the fourth series, predate 1916, though a cash book extends 1901-1936, and a check register runs to 1933. In the absence of ledgers and journals, common to most of the Day Mines, Inc. records, receipt books, paid checks, invoices, and bank statements were kept.
The fifth series, Personnel Records, contains only two time books, one dated 1901, the other dated 1901-1908. The final series, Tax Records, contains only two folders, mostly tax returns, federal and state. Some correspondence related to taxes is in each folder.
Removal of blank and returned proxy statements, assessment receipts, blank checks, and duplicate materials reduced this collection by two cubic feet.
The records of the Humming Bird Mining Company are part of the records of Day Mines, Inc., donated to the University of Idaho by Henry Day in 1984 and 1985.
Initial processing of this manuscript group was done by Marilyn Sandmeyer in September 1987.
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the online catalog. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.