Phoenix

Q: Was Phoenix, BC really a city?

Yes. Incorporated in 1900, promoted as the highest city in Canada, with 4,000 people at its height, seventeen saloons, four churches, two railways, a hospital, a brewery and a covered skating rink. It dissolved in 1919 when the mine closed.

Q: Can you visit the Phoenix Mine?

The history can be visited; the cenotaph still stands. The workings are dangerous: abandoned mines can kill. The films exist so no one ever has to go.

The highest city in British Columbia — 1,500 people, twenty saloons, four banks and a skating rink — and the mine that built it, emptied it, and finally came back to swallow it whole.

Staked 15 July 1891 · Closed 4 October 1978 · Still down there

21.55M

Tonnes of ore

911,172

Ounces of gold

5.88M

Ounces of silver

519.6M

Pounds of copper

37 km

Of workings underground

The Phoenix Record

MINFILE No.

082ESE020

Also known as

Old Ironsides · Knob Hill · Granby Phoenix · Granby Mines · Victoria · Aetna · Idaho · Rawhide

Commodities

Copper, gold, silver

Worked

1900–1919, intermittently to 1942, open pit 1959–78

Status

Past producer. Underground workings largely inaccessible; open pit and townsite remain.

Camp & division

Phoenix camp · Boundary · Greenwood Mining Division

The record pack · No. 1 in the series

Inside: the whole story, the numbers, the photographs, the film — and the names of the men who worked it. Made to be printed and kept.

Download the record · PDF

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Snapshot compiled 30 Aug 2026 · Source: BC Geological Survey MINFILE, detail and production reports. Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence — British Columbia.

Frank on Phoenix · 90 seconds

The story in his own voice — then take the record with you.

The Story

Two lives of a mountain

Staked twice on the same July day by two men who couldn’t afford to work it — financed by a rubber-boot maker from Quebec — killed by peace — and reawakened to eat its own city.

15 July 1891

Two claims, one hill, one day

Henry White staked the Knob Hill claim and Matthew Hatter staked Old Ironsides beside it — the same day, on the same hill. Neither man had the money to work what they had found. That came from an unlikely direction: J.F.C. Miner, a rubber-boot manufacturer from Granby, Quebec, whose syndicate would become the Granby Consolidated Mining, Smelting and Power Company. The Quebec town’s name still sits on the smelter site at Grand Forks, and on the river.

1900

The wire that fed the boom

Granby began production at the moment North American cities were being wired for electricity, and copper had become the metal that carried it. A railway branch was pushed up the mountain. The largest smelter in the British Empire at the time was built at Grand Forks, and it ran around the clock. On the hill above the workings a city rose — by Frank’s telling, 4,000 people, seventeen saloons, four churches and a skating rink, the highest city in British Columbia.

1919

Killed by peace

It ended quickly. The war’s copper demand vanished, prices collapsed, grades had thinned, and coking coal for the smelter ran short. Within months the camps closed and the city emptied. Four decades of near-silence followed: clean-up work, and Depression-era leasers picking at what remained — W.E. McArthur of Greenwood bought the dead giant and worked it alone through the thirties.

1959

The mountain comes back — and eats the city

An open pit was begun, and over the next twenty years it consumed both the old underground workings and the townsite that had stood above them. Mining stopped in August 1976 while the mill ground through the stockpile into 1977 — and for its final year, ore trucked up from the Lone Star property just across the border in Washington State kept the mill fed: the great Canadian camp finished its life milling American rock. The mine closed on 4 October 1978.

The second life

A camera goes back underground

Frank found Phoenix from the air — a huge open pit, a lake, and a mountainside the record calls inaccessible. The record, as it turns out, is largely honourable but not entirely right: there are miles of workings left, rail still in place, and the underground that gave up more than twenty million tonnes still keeps its rooms. The films are the only visits it gets now.

The Descent

Frank’s camera, inside the mountain

Frank Schlichting leaning on an ore car above a dark winze in the Phoenix Mine, smiling by headlamp.

Feature documentary · Sound up

UNDERMINE — Phoenix, Anyox, and the mines they left behind

The Phoenix chapters of Frank’s Telus STORYHIVE documentary — deep inside workings the record calls inaccessible. Watch it now →

Do not do what Frank does

“First of all: you should never go into a mine.” That is Frank’s own first rule, and he means it. He has spent more than a decade underground — trained, equipped, and working with people who know what they are doing — and he is still at risk every time he goes in. Nothing you see in his films is safe. It is survivable, on a good day, by a man who has spent years learning how.

What Frank does is extremely dangerous. Abandoned mines kill: bad air that gives no warning, rotten timber, hidden shafts under loose ground, rock that fails without a sound. His rule of threes underground — three minutes without air, three days without water, three weeks without food, and three months without hope. Alone down there, no one finds you in time. The films exist so that no one else ever has to go.

And one rule as firm as the first: these places, and everything left in them, are history. Take nothing, damage nothing, leave every site exactly as you found it. What truly must come out before the mountain takes it is museum work — documented, and kept in public trust at the Yankee Boy Mine Museum. History belongs in a museum, not on a souvenir shelf.

Field notes · In Frank’s words

“Just like Swiss cheese up there.”

Frank found Phoenix from the air. He had moved to Grand Forks partly to fly more, and one day he passed over the site without knowing what he was looking at — a huge open pit and a lake, and a mountainside riddled with workings.

What struck him afterwards was how completely the place had been written off locally. “A lot of people know about Phoenix in this area — the funny thing is nobody thinks there’s anything there. They just assume everything’s all wiped out.” It isn’t. There are miles of tunnel on multiple levels, rail still in place, and an underground that gave up more than twenty million tonnes — still keeping its rooms.

— Frank, from the film

From the Archive

What the camera saw

Pushing the camera ahead of him — belly-down under a low back.

A ladder still standing in the chute timbering — the way up, left as they built it.

Setting the rope before the drop — every descent begins with the rigging.

The Neighbourhood

Nearby workings

Snowshoe Rawhide Brooklyn & Stemwinder Gold Drop Mother Lode

All of these worked the same hills — the camps of the Boundary district, one of the richest copper regions in the province’s history.

Next in the camp: Snowshoe →

The Record in Full

The Phoenix Mine, British Columbia — the complete record

The highest city in British Columbia

Phoenix was promoted in its day as the highest incorporated city in Canada — a mining boom town of the Boundary District that grew beside its copper mine until the two were inseparable. At its height the provincial record credits it with 4,000 people, seventeen saloons, four churches, a hospital, a brewery, tennis courts and a covered skating rink.

Two railways climbed the mountain to reach it. The city was incorporated in 1900, and in 1911 its hockey club — champions of British Columbia — submitted a challenge for the Stanley Cup. The challenge was deferred a season and never played, but the confidence says everything: Phoenix did not consider itself a temporary camp.

Inside the mountain: the workings

The ore was a copper-gold skarn — chalcopyrite, pyrite and magnetite formed where hot mineralising fluids replaced a band of impure limestone, and it was self-fluxing, meaning it could be smelted with little more than coke. That chemistry is why a low-grade mountain became a working giant when richer prospects nearby did not.

By the shutdown of June 1919 the underground mine had grown to roughly thirty-seven kilometres of interconnected workings on multiple adit levels, with stoped areas exceeding 48,000 square metres. Old Ironsides had already hosted some of the earliest open-pit mining in Canada, worked by steam shovel from 1903. The Granby self-dumping ore car, a design that spread through the industry, was built here in 1905.

It was never one hole in the ground, which is why it answers to so many names. The province records mining here from four principal ore bodies: one beneath the Old Ironsides, Knob Hill and Victoria claims; a second beneath Gold Drop, Rawhide and Snowshoe; a third beneath Brooklyn and Idaho; and a fourth beneath Stemwinder. Ten further claims are attached to the mine in the record — Aetna, Curlew, Monarch, Gilt Edge, Red Rock, Bald Eagle, Grey Eagle, War Eagle, Bank of England and Yellow Jacket — names from a decade when a man with a pick could still name a mountain. Most carry their own occurrence number in the provincial files. All of them were worked as one mine.

What the Phoenix Mine produced

Across 1900–1978 the province’s production table records 21,552,283 tonnes of ore mined, yielding 911,172 troy ounces of gold, 5,884,736 ounces of silver and 519,613,469 pounds of copper.

Those totals are consolidated. The province reports Phoenix as a single operation covering the claims worked with it — Old Ironsides, Aetna and Victoria among them — so the tonnage above is the mountain’s, not any one claim’s. Figures published for those claims separately are part of this same total, not additional to it.

The biggest year was 1912 — more than 1.13 million tonnes mined and over fourteen million kilograms of copper recovered. Gold peaked in 1908. And silver peaked in 1909, not 1913 as sometimes repeated — the ledger settles it by 12,099 grams.

These figures are reproduced from the government record bound into the downloadable Phoenix record on this page.

The mountain today

The province lists Phoenix as a past producer. The open pit and traces of the townsite remain, the city’s war memorial still stands, and the underground workings the record calls inaccessible are largely gone — mined away by the pit that followed them.

The mountain is not finished being asked questions: exploration drilling resumed beneath the old mine in 2025.

Whatever comes of it, the first two lives of Phoenix are complete, and this record — with the government’s own pages bound in — is their account. Frank’s films go where no reader should: inside what remains.

In this record

The highest city in British Columbia Inside the mountain: the workings What the Phoenix Mine produced The mountain today Questions about the mine

Questions

Questions about the Phoenix Mine

How much gold came out of the Phoenix Mine?

911,172 troy ounces of gold were recovered between 1900 and 1978, per the province’s production table — alongside 519.6 million pounds of copper and 5.88 million ounces of silver. Copper was the mine’s backbone; gold and silver rode with it.

Was Phoenix, BC really a city?

Yes — incorporated in 1900, promoted as the highest city in Canada, with 4,000 people at its height, seventeen saloons, four churches, two railways, a hospital, a brewery and a covered skating rink. Its hockey club challenged for the Stanley Cup in 1911. The city dissolved in 1919 when the mine closed.

Why did the Phoenix Mine close?

Twice, for different reasons. In 1919: collapsing post-war copper prices, thinning ore grades and a shortage of coking coal for the Grand Forks smelter. In 1978: the modern open pit had recovered what remained, and the operation wound down — the last day was 4 October 1978.

Does the Phoenix Mine still exist?

As a place, yes; as a working mine, no. It is a past producer in the provincial record. The open pit remains, along with traces of the townsite and the Phoenix cenotaph. Most of the historic underground workings were mined away by the pit. Exploration drilling beneath the old mine resumed in 2025.

Can you visit the Phoenix Mine?

The history can be visited — the cenotaph still stands to the men of Phoenix. The workings are another matter. Abandoned mines can kill: bad air, rotten timber, hidden shafts, ground that fails without warning. The films exist so no one ever has to go — watch them from this page, and take the record with you instead.

Who staked the Phoenix claims?

Henry White staked Knob Hill and Matthew Hatter staked Old Ironsides on the same day — 15 July 1891. Both claims were Crown granted in 1896, and they became the centre of the Granby operation that built the city.

Why does the Phoenix Mine have so many names?

Because it was never one mine. The provincial record files Phoenix under fourteen names — Knob Hill, Old Ironsides, Granby Phoenix, Victoria, Aetna, Idaho, Brooklyn, Stemwinder, Gold Drop, Snowshoe and Rawhide among them — each a claim staked separately in the 1890s and later worked as part of one operation. Most also hold their own occurrence number in the province’s files. When you meet an old reference to the Knob Hill mine, or the Gold Drop, or the Rawhide, it is this mountain.

Sources & Records

BC Geological Survey MINFILE 082ESE020, detail and production reports · Federal mineral-resources index card, Phoenix (Cu) · BC Minister of Mines Annual Reports, 1899 onward · BC Geographical Names, Phoenix · LeRoy, Geological Survey Memoir 21 (1912) · Footage and photographs: Frank Schlichting.

Alias list follows MINFILE 082ESE020’s recorded names; “Granby Mines” is the operator’s common historical name, retained here because readers search for it. Page updated 31 August 2026.

The record isn’t finished

Worked at Phoenix? Knew someone who did? If you hold something the record doesn’t — a name, a story, a photograph — write to Frank. What checks out becomes part of this page, credited.

Every mine gets its letter eventually. Be there when Phoenix gets another.

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