Painesdale Mine and Shaft’s Connection to the Community Continues Through Its Volunteers

Nestled in Painesdale lies the old Champion #4 Shaft Rockhouse, previously owned by the Copper Range Company. Today the former mine location still stands, receiving visitors rather than sending ore out. Painesdale Mine and Shaft President Michael Prast says that after the location was saved by local community efforts. 

“And obviously when the mine closed, they couldn’t stop that. And people still lived around here so they turned the Champion #4 over to the Adams Township Water Department, which then operated it until about 1998. Where they were going down to the underground to manage the pumps and things like that. However, they deemed it too expensive and dangerous to keep going down. So they moved the pumps above ground in the late ’90s. Now they tap it from the top. And then they close it off. At that point, the local community had seen all the other shaft houses disappear and a lot of other historic mining infrastructure disappear. And so they banded together to save the Champion #4 and a few of its associated buildings. Thus creating our nonprofit organization to continue to preserve and give tours of it.“ – Michael Prast, President, Painesdale Mine and Shaft Board of Trustees

This year the Painesdale shaft expanded a section of the upper levels for tours. Discovering old handwriting on some of the walls. Prast says that making these sorts of discoveries is what adds to the experience of visitors to the mine. 

“We spent several years, pretty much since the 90s, kind of stabilizing the buildings. And we have finally gotten to the point where we have the buildings structurally stabilized. And so our hope, our goal is to then start to expand our tour system. And since we don’t have any underground access. We focus on telling the story of the above-ground part once everything leaves the mine. This is kind of a unique part because not many of the surface buildings do not survive in a lot of places up here. It was our goal starting a couple of years ago to get people up into the upper levels to see this machinery that was kind of frozen in place and show off what happens after things leave the mine. And so we started by getting all the walkways rehabbed using as much of the original structure as possible. And then just began replacing and fixing what needed to be done last year. Luckily we were able to find some more funding this year and expand in the same general area of the building but expand access to different parts of the machinery and stuff one of which was that room that has the handwriting and it was kind of like a locker room for the rock house workers up there. So over the years and the earliest date I had, I thought I saw was 1935 or something. And so it is over the years people throw random things while they are working to either jot a note or out of boredom. So that’s always our goal for the tours is to kind of give that unique looks like they left yesterday kind of experience.” – Michael Prast, President, Painesdale Mine and Shaft Board of Trustees

On Saturday the Painesdale mine and shaft will ask for volunteers to help with some outside work to prepare the area for visitors this summer taking the surface-level tours and walking the grounds. 

“All of us currently involved do it for the sake that we love it and we love telling the story of our local communities. We were very closely connected to the Painesdale community as well, especially after doing so much work to kind of maintain the outside in recent years. You know, we’ve got kind of like a neighborhood watch essentially. People in the community always walk by and end up keeping an eye on things or cleaning up garbage when they see it. Which is nice. Then the National Park Service here put forward an initiative to kind of help organize volunteers to go to the different mine sites and our turn happens this weekend. So they helped organize advertising volunteers to come down and help clear the winter debris and pull weeds and things like that to help us remove some of the things that aren’t historically accurate. And make sure people can see our buildings and make it look nice as well.” – Michael Prast, President, Painesdale Mine and Shaft Board of Trustees

The Painesdale Mine and Shaft ask that those interested in helping out this Saturday wear clothes you don’t mind getting a little dirty. While at the Painesdale Mine and Shaft workday, volunteers can learn more about getting involved with the organization or becoming a member. The Painesdale Mine and Shaft will begin offering tours of the grounds and the rock house starting in June. Those interested in learning more about the volunteer workday or the Champion #4 mine in Painesdale can find more information here.

The Painesdale Mine and Shaft Workday on Saturday will begin at 9am. Find the mine located at 42634 2nd St (Shaft House Road), Painesdale, MI 49955.