Tour Arizona’s Mining History - Museums, Mines and Caves

Family Fun in Arizona

Visit a Copper Mine - Learn About Mining History

Arizona is the Copper State. And where did they get all that copper for the State Capital Dome in Phoenix? From Bisbee, way to the south of Phoenix down by the Mexican border. There are some great museums and fun mining tours to take in Arizona. It’s a great draw for children. Imagine actually going into a real mine led by a retired miner. It sure beats the mine car ride I took in Disneyland as a kid! Once you go to an Arizona mining museum and tour a real mine, you will have a better understanding of the part that mining has played in developing the Copper State.

Bisbee History and Mining Museum

I highly recommend the Queen Mine Tour, just across the road from historic Bisbee. But before you go, stop by the new interactive mining exhibit at the Bisbee History and Mining Museum. The beautiful building, once the corporate headquarters of the Copper Queen Consolidated Mining Company (eventually purchased by Phelps Dodge Corporation), the museum is at the center of town. The new exhibit, is a perfect place to get a sense of how important Bisbee’s mining heritage is to the whole state. Once you go through this fun and interactive exhibit, you will understand how important copper is to modern day living, how the miner’s extracted the ore from the land and how they and their families lived. I was amazed to find out that the miners took mules into the depth of the mines to work there pulling ore cars.

When I toured, there were kids there having a great time turning wheels and going from exhibit to exhibit. We stood around a display of minerals that had been found in the mines, mesmerized by the blue, green and white glittering treasures. Once I finished my time in the museum, I was ready to experience a real mine.

Queen Mine Tour

I headed over to the Queen Mine Tour site across the highway from the historic district. I wasn’t sure what to expect but did know that I was going to see the Queen Mine, once one of the most productive mines of the area. I learned that the Phelps Dodge Corporation closed the Bisbee underground mines in 1975. At that time Bisbee came up with the idea of opening a mine tour through a portion of the world-famous copper Queen Mine to keep mining history alive.

Experiencing the Historic Mine

We bought our tickets and were greeted by retired area miners, who were to be our guides. We were outfitted with slickers, hard hats and miner’s lamps. The children loved this part. It’s a great opportunity for children, if they are old enough to take in the information the guides provide. We were led outside to a little mine train and were told that we would be going deep into the mine… straight into the mine, not down (I was relieved!). As we entered the dark tunnel, I got a sense of what it must have been like for the miners to head in to work each day on this very same mine train for a grueling 10 hour shift. It’s a year round 47 degrees in the mine but our yellow slickers kept us warm.

We stopped at several places, walked through some of the tunnels and saw mining equipment, ore still visible in the walls and marveled at the huge timbers that miners brought in to shore up the tunnels. The guide, a third generation miner, showed us how the equipment was operated and how they used dynamite to blow up the rock and expose the ore. As he talked, I realized how dangerous and unhealthy mining was. If the dust didn’t get you, the back-breaking hard work certainly would have taken it’s toll. And, the mules didn’t fare so well either. They were kept down in the mine in the dark for years and, when they started going blind, were taken out of the mine. It was a hard life.

After an hour in the mine and a great tour, we got back on the train and headed out to the welcome blue sky and light of day. It was a great experience, the combination of the museum and the actual mine tour, and I would highly recommend it.

Five tours depart each day, seven days a week, from the Queen Mine Tour Building, located immediately south of Old Bisbee’s business district, off the U.S. 80 interchange. Queen Mine Tour Website

More Mining History

• Bisbee - The Queen Mine Tours also operates van tours that take visitors out to the open pits and to the historic areas built during the mine’s heyday. Website.
• Phoenix - Arizona Mining and Mineral Museum. Just steps from the state capitol is a huge white building with a gigantic steam shovel bucket in front of it. Over 3,000 minerals, rocks, fossils and mining artifacts are on exhibit. Highlighting the collection are the colorful minerals from Arizona's copper mines. This museum also houses mining artifacts. If you area rock hound, this is the place for you! Website
• Tombstone - The Good Enough Underground Mine Tour. Former Tombstone mayor, Andree Dejournett, purchased a silver mine that was discovered by Tombstone founder, Ed Schieffelin. The Good Enough Underground Mine Tour takes visitors 550 feet underground into cool, well-lit rooms, some with 20-foot ceilings.More…

Caves to Visit

If you are in Bisbee visiting the Queen Mine and decide you want to experience more underground (and cool) attractions, head on over to Kartchner Caverns. Our Kartchner Caves article lists some great natural caves across the Southwest that you can tour.