Our Dinner: T-bones, hash browns and eggs
The year was 1929. The commodity was mercury. The discoverer is a mystery. In 1944, the owner was V.S. Baxter of Fallon, Nevada, and the workings consisted of a 175 foot drift and other level workings. A mining district was formed to include the mercury mine, and later expanded to include other mines in the area. By the time World War Two rolled around and the BLM was listing all the important mines in the area, Poinsettia wasn't even mentioned. Perhaps mercury wasn't important enough for the war effort.
Poinsettia Mine
The Poinsettia mine includes two claims about 38 miles northeast of Hawthorne, at an altitude of 5,150 feet. The property was located in 1914 and worked intermittently until the early 1930's. It was acquired by its present owner in 1939, and during 1939-42 extensive underground development was com-pleted. In 1950 significant data on the deposit was obtained by a Bureau of Mines diamond-drilling program. Leasing operations, starting in 1954, have yielded a small quantity of mercury. Underground development was done in 1958.
Rocks in the area are flat-dipping andesite tuffs and flows cut by a steep northwest-trending, northeast-dipping fault, which localized the ore deposits. Cinnabar occurs in isolated, discontinuous, small high-grade pipes, and narrow lenticular veinlets within fault planes in the shear zones.
Underground workings consist of a 188-foot vertical 2-compartment main shaft with drifts and Crosscuts on the 70- and 170-foot levels, a shallow winze sunk from the 70-foot level, and small stopes on both levels. Other openings consist of two shallow shafts and a short adit. Selectively mined and sorted ore is treated in a 2-pipe retort.
-Poinsettia, U.S. BUREAU OF MINES
Poinsettia was never really a town, per se; it was a mine with a considerable number of support buildings nestled in a picturesque little draw. Climbing up over the hill and seeing the remaining buildings pop into view is quite dramatic, especially if you're not expecting it.
The Hawthorne, Nevada Boy Scout Troop now occupies Poinsettia, and while they tolerate visitors to their camp, they probably earn their sharpshooter merit badges on ruffians and vandals; hence, there are five or six standing buildings and several about to fall over but not quite. The cabins and the building by the mine itself are decorated in weird Boy Scout fashion, and there is a guest book to sign.
There is plenty to explore and there is considerable debris spread out over a large area.