Page:History of Southeast Missouri 1912 Volume 1.djvu/445

 HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI 385 2,071. It depends upon its mines and tlie rail- road traffic, being situated ou two lines of railroad — the Mississippi River & Bonne Terre, and the Illinois Southern. It is reached also by the St. Francois county in- terurban line. The Bank of Elvins was or- ganized in 1900 with a capital stock of $15,- 000. Bonne Tebre Bonne Terre is in the northwestern part of St. Francois county about thirteen miles from mine of Bonne Terre which had been oper- ated in a very successful manner, passed into the hands of a number of men who organized the St. Joseph Lead Company and began very soon to carry on mining operations on a much more extensive scale than formerly. They employed large numbers of men and the town consequently grew rapidly. It was under the direction of this company that the first ex- tensive shafts were sunk in the earth for the obtaining of lead in Southeast Missouri. The growth of the town and the prospect In the Bonne Terre Lead Mining District Farmington. Until after the close of the Civil war it was simply a collection of miners' huts or tents, there having been mining carried on for a number of years. It received its name from the French words meaning "good land," applied to the district because of the fact that lead ore was scattered through the clay of the region and could be obtained by simply wash- ing. This particular clay with the lead ore disseminated through it was called "bonne terre." The little village came to have this name and it was retained by the first post- office that thej' established and still applies to the town. It was in the year 186-4 that the Vol. 1—25 that it had become an important place in- duced the St. Joseph Lead Company to pro- vide for its wants. They had the town sur- veyed, laying out a number of large lots and wide .streets. The policy of the company was to keei? all the business in the town practi- cally in their own hands and they were not willing to sell property but followed the plan of leasing it for long periods of j'ears ; owing to this restriction and to the further fact that property would not be leased for the carrying on of any business which the company wished to conduct, the large part of the population grew up on the land outside of the town it-