The Glove Mine, at an elevation of 4,200 feet, is located in the Tyndall Mining District on the southwestern flank of the Santa Rita Mountains, about 50 miles south of Tucson.
Fifteen original claims, collectively known as the Glove claims, were staked between 1911 and 1917.
Discovered in 1907 by Dan J. Sheehy, Edward T. Sheehy, Jerry Sheehy, Pat J. Sheehy and A. OβDonnell, the area is known as Devilβs Cash Box Ridge because of its rich mineral deposits.
The mine was named for the massive sulfide ore-body lined tubes or chimneys extending to the southeast that appear as large fingers, or pipes, covered by a glove.
Commodities included lead (galena), zinc (sphalerite), silver, copper, gold and molybdenum.
Claims were actively worked by leasers including the Copper Queen Mining Co. from 1911 through 1917. Attracted by the lead-silver-zinc deposit found in quartz monzonite porphyry intrusion in limestone, the company shipped 612 dry tons, returning a $7,168.65 dividend. Minerals from the original workings known as the Sheehy-OβDonnel Mine, or O.K. Mine, included a mixture of galena, anglesite, wulfenite, smithsonite, covellite and cerrusite.
A mule team was responsible for transporting the ore 8 miles west to a rail station at Amado where it was taken by the Tucson-Nogales line of the Southern Pacific Railroad to the ASARCO smelter in El Paso.
Inactivity ensued between 1918 through 1951, with only several ore shipments made.
The 1950s proved to be the most productive in the mineβs history, with an average of 15 men employed who completed more than 5,000 feet of underground workings and 55 claims.
Six hundred tons of ore were produced monthly, averaging 14 percent silver and 40 percent lead.
Between 1951 and 1959, the Dallas-based Sunrise Mining Co. operated the mine under the direction of general manager Edward A. Mack. Its daily production averaged 20 tons of lead-silver ore, including the discovery of the Zombie and Zeco claims.
The most productive claims involved the Rover and the Glove, which produced 21,000 tons of lead-silver ore, valued at more than $1 million after smelter costs.
By 1957, the company had produced 13,424 dry tons. It received $540,174 in dividends after transport, assay and smelting costs.
Work continued on the mine over the next decades, including the expansion of several tunnels, driving a drift toward the orebody at the bottom level, along with exploration drilling and geophysical work.
The mine consisted of multiple levels ranging from the oxidized portion at the 250-foot level to the lower levels, reaching a depth in excess of 480 feet at the massive sulfide ore zone. Ore was transported up the incline by a 75 horsepower electric single drum hoist on a 2-ton skip (self-dumping bucket).
It was then hand-trammed several hundred feet through a tunnel by ore cars and dumped into a surface ore bin. Afterward it was shipped by rail to the ASARCO Ground Hog Mill at Deming, New Mexico.
Pollard Simons, owner of the Sunrise Mining Co., attempted to entice further investment in the mine in the early 1970s, marketing 30,000 tons of the mineβs high-grade ore reserves.
Mine Superintendent Irvin Wolfe was involved in an accident in June 1975. It involved a runaway front-end loader slipping down a dump slope. He suffered a broken arm, punctured lung, fractured skull and broken ribs.
By 1982, the Glove Mine was owned by the Sierrita Mining and Ranching Co. Activities included geologic evaluation and surface drilling and utilizing material from the Glove Mine dump to be used as road metal and shipping 50 tons of ore daily to the Tonto Basin Mill.
Although the mine today is closed to collecting, it hosts black wulfenite crystals due to manganese inclusions.
The mine is currently classified as an active claim.
A 2011 fire caused structural damage, and it is closed to mineral collectors.
