Brown's Hope
In February 1872, W.J. Brown located silver at what he called Brown's Hope, one of the first mines in the Alida District. The following month, Brown sold to Hiskey & Walker for $5,000, at which time it was believed that $20,000 was in sight. Hiskey & Walker operated a mill at White Mountain City, California, which was relocated to Lida before the end of the year. Meanwhile, Brown went on to serve as Justice of the Peace.
Brown's Hope seems to have produced intermittently, probably by lessees, through the 1870s and into the 1880s, but in 1887 it was under the ownership of Robert H. Stewart and the Walker Lake Bulletin stated that ore would soon be crushed at his mill. Little other mention was found until 1905 when San Francisco capitalists organized the Brown-Hope Mining Company, and claims from this period state that roughly $750,000-$1 million had been produced between 1872 and 1878. The excitement was short lived, and it took until 1925 when D.M. Boyle acquired the property through a law suit. Again the mine was reopened, but this came to an abrupt end when Boyle was arrested for allegedly robbing the Bank of Sparks earlier in the year.
