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History: The town of Springbok is closely associated with the history of the exploitation of copper in South Africa. The chimney of the old smelting furnace on the outskirts of the town bears witness to the earliest developments of this industry.
The first exploitation of copper in the north-west after the discovery of the Copper Mountains by Simon van der Stel in 1685, took place in the Richtersveld in 1840 at the instigation of Sir James Alexander. When those ventures proved to be uneconomic, attention was again directed to the Copper Mountains. Extensive prospecting took place there in 1840 and in 1849 the first copper ore was exported.
It was only after the firm of Phillips and King had acquired the farm Melkboschkuil, also known by the names of Koperberg and Springbokfontein, with all its mineral rights, that copper was mined at Springbok on a large scale. The mine flourished for many years, but production ceased in 1862. In 1866 Philips and King sold all their possessions and rights to the Cape Copper Company. The smelting furnace was built in the same year with the object of exploiting the large deposits of low-grade ore. When a railway line to Port Nolloth was constructed some five years later, the smelting furnace lost most of its usefulness and eventually fell into disuse, but the old chimney survives."
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