Planet, Arizona facts for kids

Planet is a small, once-busy place in La Paz County, Arizona, in the United States. It sits on the north side of the Bill Williams River. Long ago, Planet was a popular stop for travelers. It even had its own post office from 1902 to 1921. Today, Planet is a ghost town, meaning no one lives there anymore. It is now part of a special area called the Planet Ranch Conservation Area, managed by the United States Bureau of Reclamation.

Mining for Copper and Gold

The land around Planet is very old. Scientists believe it formed during the Precambrian time, billions of years ago. The rocks here are mostly pinkish gneiss, which is a type of rock that contains minerals like hematite and copper.

Discovering Minerals

People found gold and copper in La Paz County in the early 1860s. Around 1868, the Planet area started producing copper. This might have been the very first copper mine in all of Arizona!

Early miners faced challenges in the area. By 1874, the local Apache people were settled onto special lands. This made mining safer for the prospectors.

Mining Operations

In the 1880s, miners began to smelt the copper. Smelting is a process that melts the ore to get the pure metal out. The copper from Planet was very good, about 5% pure. By 1884, the mine had sent over 6,000 tons of high-quality copper all the way to San Francisco.

Transporting the copper was hard work. It cost $10 to $18 to move one ton of freight 28 miles to Planet. For a while, a stagecoach traveled between Planet and Bouse, which was 21.5 miles south, three times a week. This helped connect the remote mining town.

Big Business in Mining

The Planet mine was known for its rich natural resources. In 1906, a man named J. Stanley Jones from Denver, Colorado, owned the mine.

A new company, the NewPlanet Mining Company, took over the mine in 1909. Before that, the Planet Copper Mining Co. had been in charge since 1902. By 1916, the Planet Copper Mine was producing a huge amount of copper: about 3.9 million pounds each year! This made it the 25th most productive copper mine in the entire United States. By 1920, the company was worth about $4 million.

Planet Ranch Today

The land around the old town of Planet later became known as the Planet Ranch. The Arizona Ranch and Metals Company owned it for some time.

Changing Hands

In 1984, the City of Scottsdale bought Planet Ranch. They hoped to use its water rights to help their city, but this plan did not work out. Later, a company called Freeport-McMoRan bought the ranch from Scottsdale.

Freeport-McMoRan then leased the land to the United States Bureau of Reclamation. Eventually, they gave the land to the Arizona Game and Fish Department.

Conservation Area

Today, the Bureau of Reclamation manages the Planet Ranch. It is part of their Lower Colorado River Multi-Species Conservation Program. This program helps protect different kinds of plants and animals that live along the Colorado River.