Cleveland Paper - Sinking Through Wet Gravel and Quicksand near Norway, Mich.

An extensive swamp covers a large part of the town-site of Norway and adjacent laud. Through this swamp run two parallel oreformations. In the north one is the Aragon mine. The south one passes into the swamp on the Harrison property. On the edge of the swamp, about 1000 feet from the Aragon mine, a diamond drill, in the fall of 1889, located the ore-bearing formation and a probable ore-body. To explore further and develop this ore, the Penn Iron Mining Company proposed, in the spring of 1890, to sink a shaft. The drill had shown the depth of the glacial drift to be more than 60 feet. A test-pit near the location of the proposed shaft had struck, at a depth of 20 feet, an amount of water which a 200gallon pump was unable to lower. At the Aragon, a few years before, a shaft had been sunk to hard pan with great difficulty and many delays by the usual method of driving laths. Under the conditions it was decided to sink a caisson- or dropshaft. Two 40-horse-power boilers, a Lidgerwood engine with 4foot drum, and a good derrick were set up; and two No. 10 Kuowles