Rosario Mining Company
The New York and Honduras Rosario Mining Company (NYHRMC), known as Rosario Mining Company, was an American-owned corporation that owned and operated the Rosario mine, a gold and silver producer in central Honduras and Nicaragua.
The President of Honduras, Marco Aurelio Soto, offered companies that invested in the mine in San Juancinto a 20-year exemption from all taxes. In 1880, Julius Valentine, of New York City founded the New York and Honduras Rosario Mining Company, exchanging 50% of the Company's stock for the mining rights of the El Rosario deposits at San Juancito which were owned by Soto. Washington S. Valentine, son of Julius took over his father's post and became the figurehead of the corporation. The firm would soon become the largest mining company in the country. The Valentines also secured control of the wharf and railway at Puerto Cortes on the Honduran Atlantic Coast. In 1888, Washington Valentine founded the first private bank in Honduras, Banco de Honduras, in Tegucigalpa. Valentine and the Honduras President, Luis Bogran, owned shares in the bank.
Marco Aurelio Soto, was a major shareholder in the mining company. One of his sons married a daughter of Washington Valentine.
The Rosario Mine consisted of six holdings, each of 600 yds. long by about 200' wide, somewhat less than 500 acres (2.0 km2), where it had all mining, timber and water rights.
By 1904 accretions by Honduras Government grant and purchase increased the territory to over 12,000 acres (20 square miles). By purchase it had acquired the timber rights in the adjoining towns of Cantarranas and Valle de Angels. The mine had 16 levels, 100 feet (30 m) apart, with regular connections. The deepest level runs about 1 1⁄2 miles into the mountain. Ore reserves estimates in 1904 were 64,897 tons. In that year the company produced 1,172,377 oz. of silver, 5,202 oz. of gold, of a total value of $721,374.87. Expenses in Honduras were $396,842.72 and gross expenditures were $543,294.16, leaving a net profit of $217,289.78.
On August 24, 1916 the stockholders of the New York & Honduras Rosario Mining Company voted to increase the board from nine to eleven. One of the new vacancies was filled by H. A. Guess, Managing Director of the mining department of the American Smelting & Refining Company, owned by Daniel Guggenheim. He has been identified with that company for fifteen years, and was also consulting engineer of the Braden Cooper and Chile Cooper Companies.
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