From time to time, we hear about a place called Blue Diamond. I know it's a road that goes from Las Vegas Blvd. at Silverton west toward the old Bonnie Springs, then on to Pahrump. But where is it exactly? And can you tell us how it got its name? Surely, it doesn't have to do with the almond company or actual blue diamonds! Or does it?
Blue Diamond the road is named after Blue Diamond the town that was named after Blue Diamond the mine that was named after Blue Diamond the hill that was named after Blue Diamond the corporation.
And no, it’s not Blue Diamond the almond company, though we suspect that the name of the mining company was, likewise, based on the famous blue diamond, which became known as the Hope Diamond (after a 19th century British gem dealer, Henry Philip Hope).
The Blue Diamond mining company was formed in 1900 in Tehachapi, California, by one J.W. Jamison, who mined a high-quality lime (calcium oxide or calcium hydroxide, used in cement and other building materials) there; in 1923, he and his partners purchased a gypsum mine just beyond Red Rock Canyon 15 miles west of the dusty railroad town of Las Vegas, serviced by a tiny settlement of miners called Cottonwood Springs.
The mine was near the top of the 4,950-foot hill that was named for the mining company. The gypsum, also used in construction materials, such as plasterboard and drywall, was mined from a layer of Permian Kaibab limestone on the westward slope of Blue Diamond Hill.
Blue Diamond Corporation built a mill there in 1941; the mill also took the name of the hill. The name of the settlement, Cottonwood Springs, was changed to Blue Diamondville in 1942 when a post office was established there. But sometime in the next few months, for some reason lost in the mists of history, the name Blue Diamondville was shorted to Blue Diamond.
The gypsum mine, which grew to 2,400 acres, operated for another 62 years. A conveyor belt ran from the top of the hill down to the processing plant until the mine was shut down in 2004. The mill processed gypsum mined in Arizona into drywall until the early 2000s when the land was sold to a local developer.
