Red Lodge daily news combined with Carbon County news., 1934-01-17
CLARkS FORK DESCRIBED AS LITERAL
RIVER OF GOLD BY GEOLOGIC THEORY


ion to its merging with the yell
lowstone river at Laurel, is laden
with gold carried down by its
waters over hundreds of years
from the rich deposits which re
Gently came to light in the New
World mining district, said DR.. j.
C. F. Siegfriedt, Red Lodge pal
eontologist-at-large who has his
fingers on the newly awakened
pulse of mining activities in the
Cooke region, here Wednesday.
Characterizing the Clark's Fork
as a literal "river of gold," DR..
Siegfriedt said that his statement
was based on a geological study
of the origin of the gold deposits
in the New World district and is
being borne out by actual expert
ments now underway there.
The geologic studies, DR.. Sieg-
friedt said, reveal that the col
ored-talc deposits which are yield
ing gold values varying from $40
to $500 a ton, in the Red noun
tain and Scotch Bonnet mountain
region near Cooke City, are but
remnants of a vast deposit which
formerly laid there, and prospect
ing operations have shown that
the present Cooke deposits are by
no means a small one. Briefly, the
geologic theory is that the fine,
or calcium" gold, found in the
Gros Ventre clays of the region,
was impregnated in the strata
by gases from a huge lava or
rhyolite dyke which showed itself
up through the center of the New
World district. This occurred far
below the surface, subsequently
the whole area underwent a gi-
gantic uplift.
The evidence indicates that the
mining rea was once filled to the
brim with the gold-bearing ma
terial from Red mountain to
Scotch Bonnet mountain, a fill
one mile wide and some 5000 feet
in depth. Stream action of the
Clark's Fork over 1 great period
of time, together with other eros
i've forces, carried away a huge
bulk of this deposit and gave the
area its present aspect. That vast
amounts of gold was carried
down stream by the swift-flowing
waters is an actually which can
not be overlooked, DR.. ~Siegfriedt
AYERS.
A theory held in he Cooke City
region since gold was first dis
covered there 80 OF 40 years ago
was that gold had lever been en-
countered above th Box Canyon
or Pat O'Hara creek. The newer
geological theroy lolds that fine
colds are found al along the
Clark's Fork from the rivers
mouth at Laurel up to the Saddle
between the head If the Clark's
Fork and Stillwate rivers near
Cooke and on the present site
where Walter McIaren, eastern
ice cream cone magate, who came
west seeking heath, discovered
the rich gold contat of the col
ored clays in the New World dis
trict last summer.
The former theoy chung to it's
belief that gold wuld never be
discovered above Pat O'Hara
creek mainly for tie reason that
the river flowed toe swiftly to al
low depositing of tie metal. The,
newer theory ages partially
with this and poins out that at
the time the river was eating
away the great dposit it must
have been a much larger stream
than at present anc had a volum-
inal flow at least en- times as
great as it has tody.
Evidences of the size of the
river had once attsned is had in
the debris plains wich extend for
miles along the curse of the
Clark's Fork. Rushing forth from
the mouths of the canyons, the
waters of the Clak's Fork, no
longer confined b. rock walls,
spread out, ,droppig the coarser
fragments of rive silt, and the
finer particles as is flow slack
ened and widened N the valleys
floor The currentsswept over the
surface without ~resraint, excavat-
ing a little here, fling there, but
on the whole ever hiding upward
the plain of river chris. A great
portion of the gol deposits at
Cooke were depositd in these de-
bris heaps, and here, says DR..
~Siegfriedt, are he treasure
troves" of the Glars Fork.
Test holes sun into debris
benches along the rivers course
near Belfry are prying this point,
according to DR.. Sgfriedt. Sands
taken from the be of the rivers
present course ha, assayed from