The Goldfield news and weekly tribune. [volume] (Goldfield, Nev.) 1911-1947, 1919-09-06
BELIEVE THEIR FIND
IS OLD SPANISH MINE

AFTER q period OF aDOut oV years
of ~idleness, what is supposed to be
the old lost Spanish mine is about
to become one of the richest gold
and silver properties In the state.
Years ago.. before the old LaPlatte
mining boom, two Spaniards, 1t is
said, made regular trips through
Jim Town (which Is not Fallon)
with high grade ore and gold dust
packed on burros, which they
Ishipped to San Francisco. These
~Spaniards seemed to enjoy great
prosperity, and there was much
gossip and conjecture as to the
source of their supply, but as all
of their movements and workings
were carried on in secret all that
was known regarding their mine
was that they came from the Sill
yer Range. These trips were made
known of the Spaniards vas that
on n of their trips they stated
that they were going to Spain, and
that they would be gone two years.
They never returned, and they and
their mine passed almost into OBJ
%livion with the passage of the years.
Only a very few persons remember
anything about them today, but the
discovery of an old mine in the Sill
yer Range, whose identity was pre-
viously unknown and which was evil
IDENTIFY hidden as cunningly as pos
sible, has led to a revival of stories
of these old Spaniards and to the
conjecture that this was their old
mine.
In 1909 Jess Cornell and a COM
panion were searching through the
hills east of Mountain Wells for oil
locations, this being the time of the
first oil excitement in. this COM
munity, indications of oil having
been discovered in the way OF
shales, sandstone and asphaltum.
and they accidentally came upon an
old mine. The old dump was lev
eled off to look like the natural sur
face, and the shaft was filled with
stumps of trees, sage brush, rocks
and dirt. Connell proceeded to
remove this impedimenta and got
down as, far as the water level,
where he discovered a drift leading
in a westerly direction and filled
with similar debris as that found in
the shaft. Connell was not at the time
overly endowed with the necessary
capital for developing his find. and
having a partner VINO was not a
prospector and who failed to see
the possibilities in their find. he
was forced to abandon it. Before
doing SO, however, he crawled back
proceeded to explore it by the light
of a candle. His investigation
showed him that the drift vas filled
by some one, as the roof was In
first class shape. According to his
estimation. he succeeded in getting
back about 60 feet into the drift.
Here the air was very bad, and the
candle threatened to go out, but he
managed to secure a sample from
the root of the drift. which was por-
phyritic quartz of a honeycomb
texture and which assayed SIS in
gold. Cornell suspected all along
that this must be some old mine
that had been purposely covered
up, for a party could walk within
SO feet of the old shaft, owing to
the natural formation of the sur
rounding country, and never dis
cover anything unusual. 1t lays in
a natural basin and cannot be seen
from the surrounding mountains.
On the surface there is ar out
cropping nearly a blind lead or vein
about four feet ,across. which pans
free gold and is full of bromides
and chlorides of silver. This Is a
fine porphyry+quartz vein and is
very rich in gold and silver, they
say. On looking over the ground,
prospecting, it was discovered that
this vein cropped at intervals and
at intervals was almost hidden, be-
ing on the same level as the natural
contour of the country whereabouts
for over a mile, showing that it is
a large fissure vein extending
easterly and westerly through the
country.
As stated above, Mr.. Connell was
forced to abandon this find, and in
doing so did not tell any n of its
location. He left this community