 Mindful of the possibility of losing the loyalty of California during the Civil War, the federal government backed off and Barron, Forbes Company was allowed to sell it to American investors for $1.75 million.Arthur De Wint Foote worked at New Almaden in the late 1870s under James Butterworth Randol.Representations of historical life at the New Almaden Mine were drawn in vivid detail by Mary Hallock Foote, the wife of Arthur DeWint Foote, the resident engineer from 1876.