Peter Copeland

Peter Copeland was born in Ohio around 1872. In 1880, at eight years old, he was living in Johnstown, Licking County, with his parents, three brothers, and a sister. By 1900, the U.S. Census placed him far from home, working as a miner in Custer, Idaho. Not long after, he moved again—this time to Luning, Nevada, then part of Esmeralda County—where he worked at the Parrott Mine.

Sometime in 1901, Copeland arrived in the newly born silver camp of Tonopah, then still known as Butler City. He leased and mined in a small way and attracted little notice. When sober, he was unremarkable. When drunk, he was prone to becoming quarrelsome or emotional.

On August 18, Copeland turned into what newspapers called a “crying drunk.” He approached nearly everyone he knew, begging to borrow a dollar for liquor. Each request was refused. Each time, he replied quietly, “Well, that settles that.”

At about 9:30 that evening, Copeland passed through the Mizpah Saloon with what one observer described as desperation in his eyes. As he left by the rear door, he told a man standing there that before long he “would be off the map.” The remark drew little attention. His words were dismissed as the meaningless talk of an intoxicated man.

A short time later, Copeland disappeared into the night.

Then the explosion came.

The blast was tremendous—violent enough to shake the town and send people into the streets. Night-shift miners working the Mizpah ledge grabbed their lanterns and hurried toward the sound. One of them stumbled upon a piece of human flesh lying on the ground and cried out, “My God, look here boys! Somebody has been blown to pieces!”

The explosion had occurred less than six hundred feet from Main Street, in plain view. Had it not been for the darkness, anyone looking in that direction would have seen Peter Copeland sitting on a twenty-five-pound box of Giant Powder.

At first, the growing crowd could not understand what had happened. They waited, straining for news, until the call came back: “Bring up more lanterns! Somebody is blown to pieces!” When the site of the explosion was finally located, there was little to suggest that a human body had been there moments before. What remained of Peter Copeland had been scattered across the hillside and down into town.

It was not until daylight that the pieces could be gathered.

Part of his head was found nearly three hundred feet from the blast. An arm lay almost five hundred feet away. Other portions of his body were recovered at distances approaching a quarter mile.

Peter Copeland was twenty-nine years old.

His funeral was held the following day at the newly-built Miners’ Hall under the auspices of the Tonopah Miners’ Union. Two hundred miners followed what remained of their unfortunate, thirsty brother to his last resting place.

In the Old Tonopah Cemetery, Peter Copeland lies not as a miner killed by chance or carelessness, but as a man who announced his leaving, was not believed, and erased himself so completely that daylight was required to prove he had ever been there at all.

Peter Copeland’s grave is neither marked nor shown on any cemetery map, leaving even his final resting place as anonymous and scattered as his death.