The Wallace miner. [volume] (Wallace, Idaho) 1907-current, 1916-08-03
Outcrops and the Prospector-- Practical
Discussion for Benefit of Prospectors
/ ewm H tor n Mining

Mammoth mines of Shasta county
California The former was original!
worked for silver. Another example
is furnished by the Ducktown mine
of Tennessee, which were first worket
for iron. Mount Morgan, in Queens
land, Australia, though always a gOlt
mine, is now a large producer OF cop
per, derived from bodies of sulphid
ore found at depth. The ontcrop o
this mine was silicious brown iroi
ore, rich in gold. The great coppe
bearing lodes of Ely and of Chino con
tain very little copper at the surface
that would attract the attention of {
prospector unfamiliar with that typ'
of deposit. The copper lodes of Butte
Montana, present merely rusty looking
outcrops of granite. In few places !!
there evidence at the surface of thu
great amount of copper lying in depth
Outcrops of this description would
hardly be called 'gossan.' Numerous
similar instances occurring in various
parts of the world may be mentioned
but those mentioned are typical.
Silver and lead-silver mines are
FIRE -uently distinguished by heavy out
crops of sllicious black oxide of man
ganese. There were a number of such
at Leadville, at or near the surface
haf Il h. nj, 1nln
at Butte, IN which are the Lexington
Alice, MoLlton, Magma Charta, and
other noted silver mines, belongs to
this class. Among the famous mines
of this type are those a. Broken Hill
In Australia. The Bunker Hill Il Sui
livan mine, In the Occur d'Alene dis
trct, Idaho, Is another. 1t Is said
that the discoverer, a man named
O'Rourke, had been following float up
the hillside through thick brush and
over fallen timber, when he came up
on the huge outcrop, he was so aston
lshed at its dimensions and great pros
pective wealth that he sat down on a
log for half an hour or more to con-
template his discovery and decide what
he had better do He finally returned
to his partner in camp without having
even put up notice, forgetting all
about 1t in his excitement. This as a
general procedure, is not to be recon-
mended, and the more valuable the
the more FOOLISH -Urf1 such
neglect be. Every prospector should
provide himself with copies of the fed
eral and local mining laws, and he
should follow out every requirement of
these laws with serupulous exactness,
for the more valuable his mine proves
to be, the more necessary will 1t be to
secure his title, and too often, with
all the painstaking care he may exer-
else, the prospector will find certain
forceful individuals who will endeavor
to find some way to get hold of his
find. In the early days gun plays
were of frequent occurrence over the
discoveries of rich mines, and they are
not wholly unknown today.
The outcrop of the Comstock lode at
Virginia City and Gold Hill, Nevada,
consists of a series of iron stained
Of quartz running along the
lower slopes of Mount Davidson. From
Cedar hill on the north to Gold hill on
the south, many of these veins along
the footwall of the great lode still may
be seen, resembling giant walls falling
into decay, Near Gold Hill there re-
main thousands of tons of low grade
gold ore outcropping in rough masses.
At Tonopah on the west slope of
Mount eddie, may be seen the rem
nants of the once extensive hard sill
cious outcrop veins that first attracted
the attention of Jim Butler the lucky
discoverer.
The Homestake mine in South Da-
kota covers some of the largest bodies
Of gold ore in the world, yet no bold
marks these immense deposits,
and never did. The formation Is horn
Dlende schist, which in places near the
surface is altered to chlorite schist
rhe hills are not abrupt, and the great
enses of ore at the time of the dis
,overy did not look unlike the sur
rock. All the ore in the
mines, and the adjacent country rock
Is Well, was red-schist and quartz
reason of the iron oxide de-
1hides and partly from the iron min
srals of the original rock. The dis
'overers were guided to the outcrop
~ the finding of gold in the gravel of
he neighboring gulches tributary to
Told Run. There are numerous places
n the Black hills. in Arizona, in New !
ida, in Southern California, and else
where, where similar formations APP
identical in appear
nee with the Homestake, yet most of !
hem are without value.
The line of the great Mother lode |
+ California is indicated by large
enses Of white quartz, and still larger
masses of ankerite, but for the most
art, these outcrops are not valuable
or their gold content. and the most
and productive mines, as a
ule, have not had prominent quartz
utcrops Generally the richest ore
boots on the Mother lode do not out
rop at the surface, but are found sew