66 67 cerro de pasco The greatest investment of the XXth century the capital. The property was well-known since the mid-18th century for its high-quality copper and silver veins. The rise in the price of minerals before the arrival of the 20th century had excited miners Octavio Valiente, David Stuart and Lizandro Proaño, who encouraged the estate of the Pflucker brothers to reinitiate the exploitation of the mine together with them. They created the Compañía San Miguel, but in the surroundings there were also properties of independent miners with significant amounts of copper such as Natividad, Gertrudis and San Francisco. It was James A. Haggin himself, enthusiastic over the promise of these deposits, who personally negotiated the purchase of these properties. But he could only do it piecemeal. It started with the San Francisco mine belonging to the Pfluckers and 50% of the Natividad mine, leaving the other half in the hands of Backus & Johnston. But it would not take long to take over the other important mines such as San Miguel, Gertrudis and Cecilia. With all of them he would form, in 1908, the Morococha Mining Co., which would become the first subsidiary company of the Cerro de Pasco Investment Co., a legal figure that would remain in place until the expropriation of the company by the Peruvian State almost seventy years later. Despite having acquired the mine in Junin, the company would only begin to exploit these properties in the middle of the following decade, since with the completion of the Rumiallana drainage tunnel in Cerro de Pasco, the first units and tunnels of the mining company in that area could be exploited more easily. For a time, this justified the postponement of operations in mines that were more distant from the Tinyahuarco smelter. To give us an idea of the magnitude of the work, the drainage tunnel allowed the central shaft and the Excelsior Mine to be drained at impressive speeds, thanks to large pumps that managed to vent 1,100 gallons per minute. Right– Mr. Agustín Arias Carracedo built the Casa de Piedra, managed the limestone quarries for Copper for decades, becoming a prominent miner in Peru.
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