of large portions of the Granite Mountain shaft.29 Another consequence was more gruesome. Helmet men found a number of victims who had apparently been scalded to death. They had been too near to Granite Mountain stations when the water was dropped. The great heat of the shaft fire instantly vaporized the liquid, creating a wave of deadly steam.30
John L. Boardman was a slight man with a weighty responsibility. As the head of Anaconda’s Safety-First crews, Boardman commanded the growing army of helmet men who began descending the mines in the early morning hours after the fire. Boardman had an additional layer of accountability, having personally trained many of Butte’s helmet men.
Photos of the rescuers taken before the disaster show men who look more like fighter pilots than miners. They model their technologically advanced equipment with an air of pride and even swagger, though a leavening of maturity is also apparent. In an era when ever-growing percentages of miners were unskilled, the Safety-First crews were drawn from the ranks of the most experienced men.
J. L. Boardman arrived at the North Butte properties shortly after the start of the fire and began an eight-day saga that would test his men’s experience. His style of supervision was described as “calm, cool, and collected.” He personally inspected each breathing apparatus before fitting it to a rescuer’s head. “Look to the valves on the helmets and take every precaution,” Boardman told them. “You must look to your own lives.”31
In contrast to the earliest rescue efforts, Boardman helped to organize a systematic sweep of the mines. With the Granite Mountain shaft spewing flames, he channeled the helmet men through adjoining mines—especially the Speculator, the High Ore, and the Badger. Within each mine, the helmet men descended systematically, “one level at a time,” beginning at the stations and then expanding their searches outward into the twisted braids of the workings. Because many rescuers were unfamiliar with the North Butte workings (especially those from Anaconda crews), miner-guides sometimes volunteered to lead the way.32
They faced a pitch-black maze encompassing hundreds of miles of underground passageways—most filled with smoke that was “saturated with steam”33 and laced with deadly gas. Each level was its own intricate maze. There were few straight lines beyond the crosscuts, the drifts instead following the haphazard path of the copper veins. For their only light, the helmet men carried “Ever Ready” flashlights. When the beams could not penetrate the murk, the rescuers dropped to their knees and followed rail lines, an action impeded in some places by the knee-deep ash on the floor.34
Obstacles frequently blocked clear passage through the narrow crosscuts and drifts. In 1917, Butte mines still used a mixture of horses and electric engines to pull ore-laden “trains.” The horses, like the miners, attempted to flee the fire and fumes. Dozens of animals lay dead along the tracks, sometimes with ore cars piled up behind them.35 The low ceilings forced the helmet men to pick their way over such obstacles in a flat-out position, all the while taking care not to bump the helmets on their heads, the breathing bags on their bellies, or the oxygen tanks on their backs. (And, of course, all the while seeking to avoid physical exertion!)
Air temperatures in the depths of the North Butte ranged from the low eighties to more than a hundred degrees, with humidity between 85 and 100 percent. The breathing apparatus, in addition to being extremely hot and cumbersome, raised the temperature of the air that the men inhaled by at least an additional ten degrees. The Fluess model sometimes raised the temperature of inhaled air to 140 degrees. As the 1917 study on apparatus noted: “[A]fter an explosion and fire there is often a high temperature, and the air is saturated with moisture. These conditions the apparatus can not be expected to overcome.”36
Yet the helmet men forged ahead. By the time they returned to the surface, their bodies were soaked in perspiration, their clothing reeked of gas, and their eyes were bloodshot from the smoke and fumes.37
For some it was worse. Many rescuers suffered injury when their helmets malfunctioned, including at least twenty “part or total prostrations.”38 Charles Fredericks, one of the helmet men who pulled Ernest Sullau from the mine, remembered detecting the “sweet odor of gas.” He ended up unconscious for several hours, pulled to the surface by his fellow rescuers and ultimately hospitalized.39
Another helmet man experiencing equipment problems was a Speculator shift boss named William Budelière. He noticed that his helmet was leaking while exploring the 1,800 level with four other men on the morning of June 9. He informed the others of his plight before a second man noticed that his helmet also was leaking. They hurried to the station, rang for the cage, and managed to make it safely to the surface. Within thirty minutes, Budelière was reequipped and back underground.40
As a shift boss at the Speculator, William Budelière had an intimate knowledge of the North Butte workings. Both his knowledge of the mines and his fortitude would soon be put to the test. Barely three hours after the malfunction of his helmet, Budelière and twelve comrades were on yet another foray into the mines—this time the first rescuers to explore the lower levels of the Speculator and Granite Mountain shafts. Miners from as low as the 2,400 level had managed to escape through adjoining mines, and there was hope that other men might still be alive below ground.
After an initial descent from the Rainbow shaft, Budelière and the others worked their way “through miles of poisonous fumes” to the 2,000 level of Granite Mountain, only to encounter a new enemy—water.41
At the lower levels of the workings, mining companies contended constantly with groundwater. Miners dealt with water problems the same way that homeowners deal with leaky basements—sump pumps. To keep the deeper workings clear of water, giant electric pumps worked twenty-four hours a day. The Granite Mountain fire, though, had cut electricity. With the electricity out, the pumps shut down, and the groundwater began to rise—augmented by the great quantities dumped down the shaft by firemen.
In the crosscut between the Speculator and Granite Mountain, Budelière and his comrades encountered water up to their armpits—rising water. Because of the crosscut’s low ceiling, only a few inches separated the surface of the deep water from the rocky roof of the tunnel. Budelière elected to keep going. For the other men, though, it was too much, and they decided to turn back.
As he slogged through the deep water, holding his head and his flashlight in the narrow band of air, Budelière reached a point where the rock above him was so low that his helmet scraped the ceiling. Incredibly, he removed the helmet and moved forward, craning his head in the narrow belt of air between the water and rock.
Budelière became the first (and for a while, the only) rescuer to reach the lower levels of the Granite Mountain workings. A Butte Miner headline hailed his courage as “Only Equaled by Those of Titanic Disaster.” He found no survivors, instead only “scores of bodies.”
Dozens of other helmet men would also play vital roles in those first hours after the fire, “assisting the almost exhausted men” who had clawed their way close to the surface. The general chaos made it difficult to estimate the precise number, though as the accident report states, the helmet men “undoubtedly saved many lives.”42
An increasingly well-organized system greeted the helmet men and the wounded miners as they were raised from the depths. At the Speculator, the Badger, and the High Ore, rough mine buildings were quickly converted into field hospitals and morgues.43
At the Speculator collar, a guard monitored entrance and exit from the shaft. Still, miners and rescuers rushed forward hopefully whenever the hoist was raised. As each man emerged (or was carried) from the cage, timekeepers O’Keefe and McDonald attempted to make an identification. Many miners, though conscious, clearly suffered from the effects of gas. In its early stages, exposure to carbon
