Germany has been a world leader in the science and engineering of mining starting in the 19th Century with institutes such as at the city of Frieberg with graduates having major contributions to the mining in the 40 year Bonanza Era of the Comstock Mining District stretching from Virginia City at the north end to Gold Hill in the middle to Silver City downhill at the southern end in the Nevada counties of Storey and Lyon where the lad of Samuel Clemens transformed into Mark Twain with his friend Dan de Quille who documented the story of the Big Bonanza Mine owned by the Consolidated Virginia Mining Company (CVMC). Mark Twain began his writing career with other equally famous authors at the Territorial Enterprise, a circulated broadsheet that provided news about the one hundred major mining companies working the Comstock Silver Vein. News and rumors created great activity in the San Francisco Stock Exchange. Many great Victorian era hotels and mansions in San Francisco attest to the fortunes made from the San Francisco Stock Exchange, California Mother Lode mining operations, Silver State mining and the contributory industries and services such as Wells Fargo Express growing into a Bank, Levi Strauss Jeans for miners, the Central Pacific Railroad leaders who sold picks and shovels and Comstock Silver King John Mackay financing the first Trans-Atlantic telephone and telegraph cable for the precursor to AT&T Inc (Atlantic Telephone and Telegraph).
During the Roman Empire - mining was the largest industry.
