Orlando B. Hardy (O. B. Hardy for short) was a wealthy mining magnate and influential entrepreneur throughout the latter part of the 19th century. His connections, reach, and access spanned several states including Ohio, California, Utah, and Arizona.
Hardy was best known for his Patent on blasting powder used in mining as a safer alternative to Nitroglycerine. Hardy was married presumably in Akron, Ohio in 1868, he was the son of William Hardy. Hardy filed for his first patent in 1879 on his powder invention and subsequently went on to file others surrounding the manufacturing of the same.
In 1880, Hardy Powder Company was born. Hardy was also associated with Vulcan Powder Company in California with H. J. Ayres as partner in manufacturing of the patented blasting powder.
Hardy was not immune to several disastrous calamities along the way including multiple explosions and total devastation of the company property. In 1882 the Vulcan Powder Company was destroyed in San Pablo, CA while Hardy was not far away in San Francisco. His brother in law died along with 13 others in the blaze; although he was superintendent, Hardy was lucky to not have been in the area. At the height of production, Vulcan Powder company was making up to 80,000 pounds of powder a week.
Another mill was built in 1884 and was described in the book, History of the Explosives Industry in America:
Stege, California, had been the location of another black powder mill about 1884, which had been built by Baum and Hardy. Orlando B. Hardy, while living at Akron, Ohio, had taken out a patent (U. S. Patent No. 220,584, 1879) for a black powder consisting of 75 parts of nitrate of soda, 20 parts of sulphur, 20 parts of charcoal, 10 parts of common salt, 5 parts of sugar and 3 parts of paraffine. About a year later he went to California and interested Julius Baum, president of the Vulcan Powder Company, who advanced him $1,000 for further experiments. Hardy built a small plant on the end of that company’s levee on the mainland and secured a contract from the Southern Pacific Rail-way through his friend J. H. Strobridge. His product was a black powder coated with about 5% of nitroglycerine, i.e., it was similar to the later Judson or RRP powder and was intended as a free-running blasting powder for bank blasting.
History of the Explosives Industry in America, Appendix V, 1093-1094, by Arthur Pine Van Gelder and Hugo Schlatter
The first plant blew up after about a year, and then a strip of land was purchased at Stege, near the Tonite works. This also blew up after a short time, killing all the employees, including Dale, the superintendent. A new plant was then built on the site of the Eureka Powder Company’s plant and this ran for two years. Hardy’s contract with the Southern Pacific specified that the powder should be made by Hardy, and he also had a contract with Baum which guaranteed him a royalty of one cent per pound. After two years, when the royalty contract ran out, Baum tried to make a new one with one-half the royalty, but Hardy would not agree to this and sold his patent to the Giant Powder Company.
Hardy’s patent No. 306,920 (1884) covered a combination of endless belts for drying the ingredients, a sieving drum and a cooled mixing machine. This was evidently used for making up a powder dust and mixing it with nitroglycerine. This mixture was then added to the larger granulated powder. After this Hardy either returned to Ohio or went to British Columbia, where he is said to have built a black powder mill near Vancouver, concerning which nothing further is known. Although its mill was not located in California, the UTAH POWDER COMPANY had its home offices in San Francisco. It was organized in the early eighties by Henry P. Sonntag, who later was identified with the Eureka Powder Company (see p. 678) and the Safety Nitro Powder Company, and its plant was located in Ogden Canyon, Utah.
In 1895 we also see an “O. B. Hardy” associated with milling and smelting of copper in SLC, Utah under Bingham Copper Company which was likely the same person.
Several years later, Hardy started yet another company: Hardy Mining & Development Company – A.T. Tucson in 1905. This was partly to work a goldmine in the heart of Arizona.
Hardy had claims throughout many states including Idaho and Gold Hill Oregon (around 1891). He was part of numerous lawsuits over the years, mostly on the winning side around various issues surrounding debt collection, fraud (or lack thereof), and other claims.
See: https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.7312/geld91436-045/pdf
Hardy owned a home Victoria, B.C. around 1886 for a time. Other notables were his ties to Powder & Mining in California in 1887, and being elected president of Akron Gold and Silver Mining Company that same year.
6.05 oz O. B. Hardy Presentation Silver Bar, undated (c1880)
While the ingot presented here is initially unassuming, the bold type is unlike any other mining related presentation ingot we have ever come across. A clear and historic keepsake surely owned by the man himself during his prime, this ingot is a time capsule and bold reminder of a mining and powder blasting magnate, along with his contributions to the Old West.
The top of the ingot is stamped with his name exactly as how he was known to the public: “O. B. HARDY” in individual letters. It weighs 188.4 grams of silver (or 6.05 troy ounces). Essentially, as made. All edges and corners bevelled by the maker for a nice appearance. 5.7×2.3×1. 4cm. All other sides blank.
This bar appeared at auction two times at Stacks, neither of which did they publish any descriptive information on the subject. It was our job to clear it up once and for all!
Stacks Americana: Colonial and Federal Coins, Medals and Currency, Featuring Selections from the Hain Family Collection Part II, 2002-01-15.
[01/2002] https://archive.org/details/americanacolonia2002stac/page/58/