Wood River times. [volume] (Hailey, Idaho) 1882-1915, 1888-01-12
WOOD RIVER.
CONCLUDING ARTICLE UPON THIS
IMPORTANT DISTRICT.

Surrounding C"mps-The Philadel.
phia 4 Idaho Company's Sn,elter ana
Mines-Tbe Gold Belt.
Written for The Oregonian by Herbert Lang]
THE GOLD BELT.
1t was not intended to 90 further
into description of the mining dis.
tricts tributary to Wood river than to
show the character of the mines and
ores, and the extent of country over
which the influence of that locality is
supposed to extend. OF late large
degree of interest has been awakened
by the report OF very large bodies Of
paying quartz in what is known as the
Gold Belt, some twelve or fifteen
miles west of HALEY, up Croy gulch,
and beyond the nascent city of Gil.
man, the center of railways. The
country is granite, the bodies are
large and are traceable for long dis
lance, the content of gold is compare
lively low, and there are sulphuretted
compounds containing the most of the
precious metals. In short, they are
typical gold quartz veins, but on a
larger SCALE than is common. A great
deal OF talking up has resulted in
several companies taking hold, and
to-day there are four or five such,
working as industriously as may be
to develop the Gold Belt. A railway
to the mines has even been projected,
and may, very likely. be carried out
at no distant day. Those Haley peo-
pie have im mense enterprise, and are
backed by the moral consciousness of
living in the finest mining town in
the Northwest, town with splendid
conveniences for pleasantly existing,
among which are finer hotels than can
be found elsewhere in Idaho or Ore,
gon, and excellent systems Of water
works and electric lights.
Some fifteen miles west by south
from HALEY is the famed Gold Belt, to
which, by the enterprise of single
newspaper, public interest has been
drawn to an unprecedented degree
The Haley TINES has published "a
map of this very interesting. and no
doubt valuable district, which shows
some fifty locations taken upon three
or four lodes of great extent, cutting
across a broken country, very clevat,
ed. and drained by various small
streams which drain into Wood river.
The country rock is g'aai,e; he lodes
carry grea. bodies Of quartz, some.
times twenty or thirty feet wide and
hundreds of feet long, containing a
small portion OF the gold, with more
or less sulphurels, which also con-
tain gold. All these claims are more
or less developed, but none very ex-
t-nsively. Two ,aiis-one of twenty,
the other of five stamps--have been
erected, and some progress made in
working ores, which belong to that
great and immensely important class
OF gold-millng and concentrating
4aartz, from which such very large
proportion of the auriferous product
Vi California, the Black Hills, Alaska
and other noted regions, Is derived.
There arc mines in each Of those
countries like those of the Gold Belt.
Several not noted but still very i'm.
portant ones in Nevada and Sierra
counties, California, have quartz Of
SIMILAR quality, similar tenor in gold,
and t. large extent are similarly
situated otherwise. 1t appears that
the tests thus far at the Canas mill
have been thoroughly conclusive ofthe
value OF the min~s, which are general.
Iy conceded to be workable deposits;
bat in no case have operations been
carried on on the extensive scale al
ways found essential to profitable
working. i'll handling low grade ores.
There is always found to be limit
below which Tho production Of ore and
the milling capacity must not fall, in
order that profit may be realized;
and corr-latively there is geometri-
cal increase in profit as the amount
of quartz mined and milled increases.
The great gold mines whose names
are SO often heard could not be work.
ed to prof, in any but the larges,
way. "A twenty stamp mill on the
Homestake would be source of loss
Instead Of profit, not only because it
costs more to mil! quartz in small
mills, bat hocauve the outside oper-
atoms when done on a small seal,
cost more, and the cheap provision for
motive power, management, etc,
which is made in case cs large mills is
not possible in smaller operations.
THE CANVAS no. 2 NINE,
The most noted claim in the Gold
Belt, has been worked considerable,
but on too small aud irrea ular Il scale
to Fay IS well rs such a quartz mine
should pay. Being for sale, it was
BONDED so,ns time since for the coles-
sal sum "f,wo and quarter million dol
lara sum greater than any n.ine in
Western Amer a ever sold for, ox-