The White Pine news. [volume] (Ely, Nev.) 1906-1910, 1909-09-16
CONTACT SHOWS
MUCH PROMISE
GRANITE AND LIME FORMATION
CUT BY FISSURE CONTAINING
MUCH COPPER PROMINENT
CAPITAL GETTING INTEREST.

ty, in the camp of Cantact, covering
over 100 square miles of surface
area. The earth motion has been
deep seated, slow and persistent, re-
sulting in a contact between granite
and lime, as we'll defined and regular
as is State street in Salt Lake county.
This contact is in the shape of an
OK bow, with the loop to the west,
extends easterly some fifteen miles,
the granite core being probably ten
miles across the widest place.
The garnite area is intdrsected
with a persistent and we'll defined
system of assuring on a cross assure.
These assures are filled with por-
phyry, showing on the surface from
five to over 800 feet wide. The i'm
pregnation of minerals by action of
thermal waters has been thorough
and persistent, both in the porphyry
filled assures and in the plastic lines
along the contact.
Wherever some obstruction to the
action of the surface waters has min
eralized the teaching process in both
that contact and fissure veins, there
is to be found shoots of high-grade
copper. The higher grade is from
one to three feet wide, a few places
showing as much as twenty feet of
6 to 8 per cent copper. The por-
phyryy ores show more teaching but
in one place I sampled thirty-four
feet of surface groupings averaging
nearly 2 " per cent copper with five
ounces silver additional. The gold
xa1r1oc ~ fcoro n +roo1 - ,,.o.
per ton, and are very spotted. The
silver values are more uniform and
will, | believe, pay for the cost of
mining.
The ''speheroidal weathering'' and
the resultant masses of granite
boulders indicate great erosion, but
the reprecipitation caused by leach
ing has no doubt kept the metallic
contents we'll within the walls, and
redeposited them at greater depth.
The secondary enrichments will no
doubt be great once the permanent
sulphide ION is reached, The sui
phides will be reached III from 100
to 300 feet according to location.
The sulphides have been cut in a
crosscut from the Brooklyn shaft at
a oCpIu VI GUO lccI, w ulu6-
teen feet of Bornite and chalcopyrite
While there is plenty of ore of
shipping values, the main reliance
of the camp will be for large bodies
of concentrating ore, for which there
is plenty of water for milling and
power purposes. The Little Salmon
river, a large stream, flows through
the heart of the camp, while smaller
streams and springs abound through
out the district for milling and do
nestle purposes. All the camp needs
is capital and a railroad.
The Minnedoka and Southwestern,
a branch of the o. S. L., is now
building from Twin Falls to Valley
Pass, a point on the Southern Pa
cific eight miles west of Cobre. Over
twenty miles is already built, and
from the best information obtainabIe
this road will be finished to Con-
tact early in 1910 and to the South
ern Pacific not later than January
1, 1911, thus giving the camp
shipping facilities from the lumber
and agricultural regions of Idaho
and Utah, the smelters at Ely and
the Salt Lake valley.
AS to capital sucn people as the
U. S. M. S. & r. Co., S. P. Snider
& Co. of Minneapolis, are already
In and others as great or greater in
the mining world are seeking admis-
sion. There are no idle men in
camp, but ! would not advise any
one to go there seeking work at pres
ent, as miners a be obtained as
fast as needed. To the prospector
| would say the contact between the
granite and lime and the porphyry
assures in the granite are mostly To-
Gated, but the lime and the contact
between the lime and overrylng
quartzite has had very little pros
pected, while as to Tuscarora and
eastward to Park Valley, Utah there
is practically an unprospected coun-
try. Some good silver and lead val
ues are found in the lime, but not
enough work has been done to de-
termine their permanency.
The development of the camp con-
sists mostly of shallow surface work.
ings necessary to location and assess
ment work. There are hundreds of
these openings, nearly all showing
ore. There are over a score of shafts
however, from 80 to 800 feet deep,
tunnels from 20 to 400 feet in length,
and almost without exception showing
increasing values as depth is attain
ed and permanency of vein structures
as we'll. Two townsites with all the
rivalry attendant in a new mining
camp are vieing for supremacy, ana
as they adjoin one will in time prob
ably absorb the other.
I have been asked what amount
of tonnage we could ship, provided
we had a railroad. That is impos-
sible to estimate. Most of the de-
velopment has been done by shaft,
and almost no drifting has been done,