Biographical Notices - Charles Mather MacNeill

Charles Mather MacNeill, President of the Utah Copper CO. and of the Chino Copper Co., and a life member of the Institute since 1899, died at his home in New York on March 17, after a very brief illness with pneumonia. Mr. MacNeill was born at Oak Park, Ill., in 1871, and began his connection with mining enterprises immediately after graduating from high school, his first position being that of cashier with the Pueblo Smelting and Refining Co. He later went to Aspen, Colo., as manager of the Holden lixiviation plant. In 1893, he went to Cripple Creek as manager of the Lawrence Reduction Works, in which Mr. Holden and the late Capt. J. R. DeLamar were large owners. It was at this plant that Mr. Jackling became associated with him. The plant was destroyed by fire and, early in 1894, Mr. MacNeill became associated with Messrs. Spencer Penrose and Charles L. Tutt in a plan to finance and erect a chlorination plant at Colorado City, Colo., for the treatment of Cripple Creek ores. This plant was erected and was known as the Colorado-Philadelphia Reduction Works. Mr. MacNeill was general manager of the plant, Mr. Tutt having been president and Mr. Penrose, secretary and treasurer. The plant was very successful and was expanded, hally being reorganized under the name of the United States Reduction & Refining Company. Late in 1903, or very early in 1904, D. C. Jackling called the attention of Messrs. MacNeill and Penrose to the copper properties in Bingham Cañon, Utah, which have since become the main properties of the Utah Copper Co. After extended examinations and milling tests, these properties were bought, Mr. MacNeill becoming president of the Utah Copper Co., Mr. Penrose, secretary-treasurer, and Mr. Jackling, general manager. Mr. MacNeill remained president of the company to the time of his death. Mr. MacNeill was also a director, a member of the executive committee, and was largely interested in the Ray Consolidated Copper Co.; he was also president and a member of the executive committee of the Chino Copper Co. He had a variety of other mining interests, but the ones mentioned were distinctly the meost important. He was a director