The Sherman Howe Mine was the high point in Vic Bailey's career in the mining industry. In 1927, as an officer in the Sherman Howe Mining Corporation he was given the assignment to construct a mining camp on Bear Creek above the Salmon River. The following year the first Sherman Howe ore was processed through the newly constructed mill.

With a young, growing family, Vic made the Sherman Howe both hearth and home for the Bailey clan. Work continued but the mountain was stingy in what it gave up. From year to year there was less profit with which to entice investments from the eastern financiers.

With the advent of World War II the dream of the Sherman Howe becoming a reality faded even further. Gold prices fell and young men went off to war, leaving not many capable hands available to work the mine. Finally, operations ceased and Vic Bailey waited for a turn of events which would change the fortunes of the Sherman Howe. But, it was not to be.

Starting in the early '50s the Sherman Howe became, once more, a place for family. With few exceptions the Bailey kids started coming back. At first it was just themselves, coming back to the place where they had learned so much about life and nature. When there were children in their families, the children were brought here and they too became students of nature and experienced the family experiences away from the "conveniences" of modern life. They experienced much of what the youngest of the Bailey kids, Caroline, recalled from her years at the Sherman Howe. Caro wrote this. First the Bailey kids, followed by another generation, and another, and yet another. Each generation came here and beheld, as John Muir put it, "the mountain's good tidings". Over the years the Sherman Howe has attracted members from the families of both Vic's sisters, Tracy and Babe, the Custers the Clines the Bonneys and the Athertons.

Nature is moving to reclaim the Sherman Howe, giving it the deserved appearance of a gold camp gone bust. The buildings deteriorate with time, the winter snows crush what isn't strengthened, the forest retakes unprotected ground. The family has held off nature's progress a bit and preserved enough of the Sherman Howe to allow it to still offer a roof and hearth and a place to experience nature and family.

A website created by John Bailey is dedicated to the Sherman Howe Mine and has recent pictures of family gatherings held there. http://www.shermanhowemine.com/