While the Copper Country continued to see expansion in the timber and lumber industry, as well as in agriculture, copper mining continued its slow decline, particularly the Calumet and Hecla company.

By 1922, its deepest shaft, the Calumet No. 4, had reached a depth of 9,070 feet, while the Hecla Branch’s No.7 shaft had reached nearly 8,200 feet in depth.

The company’s annual report for that year stated that work of removing shaft pillars and arches was progressing in the Calumet numbers 2, 4, 5 and 6 shafts, and at the Hecla Branch’s numbers 3,5,8,6 and 10 shafts.

In comparison, in 1922, at the Champion Mine, some 30 years younger than the C&H, it’s deepest shaft, the No. 3, had only reached a depth of just under 3,900 feet.

While the Champion Mining Company’s lode continued its average richness, the company was limited in what it could produce, because it, like the other companies, suffered from underground labor shortages.

The Quincy Mine, while it did not record the depths of its shafts, suffered extensively throughout 1922, including the same labor shortages plaguing the Champion.

“The labor shortage which was general throughout the Michigan district,” wrote company president William R. Todd, “was largely due to the higher pay and more agreeable employment offered by the auto industry in the lower part of the state, which drew skilled labor from the copper mines.”

Part of the problem confronting the Quincy’s ability to retain underground workers was that sections of its underground kept caving in.

“On July 12th, a series of air blasts crushed the No. 6 shaft between the 46 the and 66th levels,” Charles Lawton, general manager reported, “Which was the section of the shaft that was broken by air blasts in 1916.”

Lawton surmised that as that as the openings about the shaft along that section were so badly crushed and packed together “as to carry the weight, so that there will probably be no repetition in this part of the mine, which was opened many years ago.”

On January 19th, a fire was discovered in the No. 8 shaft, on the 65th level, which had burned to the 21st before being extinguished within two days, “causing but slight interference with operations of the No. 6 and 8 shafts.” Quincy had long had the reputation of being a dangerous mine in which to work.

Lawton’s report for 1926 may shed some light on the labor shortage issue, which was not, apparently, due solely to unsafe working conditions or just the downstate auto industry, but likely included agricultural activity.

“During the warmer months, or about on-half the year, the underground force was lower than we desired, despite the efforts to build it up,” he wrote. “During the colder months, the underground labor force was maintained fairly well and the morale of the men was better with less labor turnover.”

This corresponds closely with many historical accounts of mine workers who also owned or worked farms, leaving the mines for the summer, to return after the fall harvests. Much of that had to do with the Houghton County Potato Growers Association, which, according to the Lake Superior Farmer, on Jan. 17, 1914, reported the organization of the association having begun at the Douglass House, in Houghton, on Jan. 3rd.

The organization of the growers association followed closely on the heels of the construction of the Otter Lake Agricultural School. It was constructed on a 40-acre tract belonging to the Portage Township School District, according to Moderator-topics, Vol. 43, published in 1922. The forest it was built on was cleared for its construction, along with open fields that would serve as outdoor classrooms.

By the second anniversary of the school, its popularity had spread throughout the Midwest, according to letters received by John A. Doelle, superintendent of the Portage Township School District. The September 26, 1914 edition of the Calumet News reported:

“Prominent educators of various states bordering Michigan have commented favorable upon the institution.”

The agricultural school, in fact, drew the attention of Mrs. Henry Huist, the president of the Michigan State Teachers Association, the Calumet News reported. The association invited Doelle to deliver an illustrated lecture on the Otter Lake school at the Oct., 1914 State Teachers’ Convention in Kalamazoo. In 1919, the name of which was later changed to the John A. Doelle Agricultural School. It was the first agricultural grade school of its kind in the state of Michigan.

At the same time, the Worcester Lumber Company opened an exhibit in time for the 1914 Copper Country Fair, demonstrating the company’s farmlands near Chassell. The lumber company had decided, in the spring of 1913, to convert some of its cutover tracts to agricultural lands. By the summer of 1914, eight families, all of German descent, brought in from neighboring states. Fifty more began farming on the tracts before winter that year.

While the mining companies continued to struggle with a shortage of underground labor, in 1919, a group of farmers and local businessmen, led by Houghton County Agricultural Agent Leo Geismer, organized the Houghton Mill and Elevator Company, more commonly known as the Houghton Flour Mill.

According to the Houghton Centennial: Souvenir history and program, published in 1961, the goal of the organizers was to promote the growing of “good, clean wheat, barley, and rye grains” in the area and in turn mill these grains into flour.” The mill was located on the site of the present National Park Service buildings for the Isle Royale National Park.

The flour mill venture was short-lived, largely because cereal grain production was not feasible in the Copper Country. Still, its construction, funded by local business owners and farmers, was a strong statement on the growing popularity of the agricultural industry in the Lake Superior copper region.