Shafter, Texas . . . Silver 'Boom' Town? Could Shafter, Texas become another 'silver' boom town? Back in July, 2008 the old historic Shafter silver mine, located in southwest Texas, was purchased from Silver Standard Resources by the Vancouver-based Aurcana Corporation. Aurcana paid approximately $42.5 million for the property. When the deal was finalized in July of that year, silver values were ranging anywhere from a low of around $17.00 to a high of around $19.40. In fact, silver values were pretty much all over the charts for 2008 with the lowest value near $8.40 (October, 2008) and the highest value near $21.00 (March, 2008). It's been almost 70 years since the old Shafter mine, considered one of the nation's most reliable silver sources, was in production (1883 to 1942). Once home to a bustling community, Shafter had become nothing much more than a ghost town -approximately 60 residents - partly due to the low price of silver. However, with the value of silver tripling since 2009, these few local residents are now seeing lots of action. The Rio Grande Mining Company (a subsidiary of the Aurcana Corporation) will likely be Texas' only silver mine and hope to be producing 800 pound silver bars within the next year. This is half the amount produced by the nation's largest silver operation located in Alaska, the Greens Creek mine. Fortunately, most of the needed infrastructures still in place, production is expected to start at Shafter in mid-2012. The 1 500-t/d operation will produce around 3,8-million ounces a year, the company said. According to a company representative, they will be mining the exact same vein of silver and ore body - only a little deeper. Taking advantage of previous work the new owners are opting to use the existing smaller tunnels rather than break into new rock. They also say that today's modern mining techniques and chemical processes which separate the silver from the rock make mining the old vein more attractive. These same new techniques will also be used to process the piles of waste rock left behind by the old mining operators many years ago. The demand for silver will be ever-growing what with its popularity for jewelry, as an investment and need in certain industrial manufacturing situations. To fill this need, the Rio Grande Mining Company said it expects to produce a total of five-million ounces of silver a year by 2012 and do it while the price of silver it up. Return to Gold Coins-Silver Bullion Home Use of this page constitutes acceptance and understanding of Gold Coins-Silver Bullion Terms. Copyright - All Rights Reserved GC-SB makes no claim to any content but offers it solely as information to its visitors.