Show potentially GREAT GOLD PLACER MINING FIELDS by H A strauss the state of utah contains important placer deposits the precious metals and the earths of rare this is not generally en b known principally due to the fact that innumerable efforts made in the past to recover the values from these placers have failed for reasons outlined in the following within these placers there have been identified as occurring in commercial quantities gold platinum iridium osmium uni palladium and other metals of the platinum group and also monazite carrying the rare earth metal thorium P I 1 in addition the almost proverbial black sands occur in exceedingly large 6 quantities in certain of the placers in fact in such amounts that where they can be shipped cheaply to the smelters shelters sm elters the iron of which they are mainly composed may easily pay if not the entire at least a lar large lare b e part of the cost of the recovery of the precious metals these black sands containing principally magnetite with limonite and and heavy silicates such as garnet and zircon are worth considerable as a fluzin flexing fluxing 6 factor placers classified alluvial placers it is ve well known are placers containing values that have been carried 6 greater reater or lesser distances b by y the action of water vater in other words alluvial placers are placers containing containing conta inin 9 gold b old or precious metals found in association with water worn material they may be regarded as the ordinary typical placer and may consist of the stream bed itself or gravel or sand bars that are at present exposed in the stream or on the banks or finally they may be ancient gravel or sand bars deposited by the river ages t ago but which may now be far distant from the stream itself placers on the other hand afe are placers that as the ahe name implies have been deposited by the rotting of the value bearing 6 rock in places to a b greater or lesser depth and shifted by th the e wind vind if shifted at all in other words they are distinguished from alluvial placers by the fact that they are wind shift shifted ed deposits instead of water shifted deposits alluvial placers in utah are found in the bin binham bingham 6 ham district on the colorado river and on its tributaries tributa ries t the he green the grand and the san juan rivers placers in utah are found near the lasal mountains in grand county in the marysvale Marys vale district in the henry mountains in garfield county and in a number of other high lying mesas in various parts of the state in the case of the river placers that is the alluvial deposits both bench and stream placers occur and in the case of the deposits both entirely dry placers as we well ss as placers of this type with some water available close by are e found in various parts of the state metals finally divided in the case of the alluvial placers throughout the state the t gold and platinum wherever it develops is found in an exceedingly finely divided state in fact the gold of the al jovial ovial deposits of utah is quite generally so very fine that lt it is is almost safe to make a geneval general statement to the effect tb a at t all utah alluvial gold is of the so called flour or if lake hake type even though there are a few exceptions but even where these exceptions occur there is no record available avaid e so far as the writer knows where chefe the larger type of allu pluvial vial nugget gold has been found in utah it is a well known fact that a single color of which two tho ou mand sand may be required to equal in value one cent is is easily d discernible iscer nible by the naked eye in the miners pan and sold of this degree of fineness or close to it is a common occurrence currence ur rence in certain rivers of utah the washings or I 1 consulting to the mining com anit engineer in paper submitted tee itee of the chamber of 0 commerce salt lake rather the residue in a hand panning operation on streams ot of utah which may show several hundred colors is therefore not always an indication of great reat value such finely divided gold which which manhave may have the appearance of an almost impalpable powder is exceedingly difficult to recover by the ordinary gold placer sluicing methods this is principally due to the fact that unless the buoyancy of such extremely fine particles can be overcome and they be caused to settle by gravity as the stream of N water and sand in which they are contained moves along through 6 the sluices they will tend to be carried suspended in the moving column into the tailings and lost solution of difficult problem right here is one of the principal problems involved in the recovery recover y of gold contained in the utah alluvial placers this problem as indicated in the foregoing is is therefore one of concentration for if these finally divided values can be concentrated by suitable devices that is to say saved from going over into the tailings tailing s there remains then only the problem of recovering the values from the concentrates for which a satisfactory process is now available if however in addition to being in an extremely finely divided state these gold particles are also covered which is a common occurrence in utah with a thin film of silica or a film of oxide of iron or by any other foreign material the problem of recovery is still further complicated gold so covered resists absolutely and completely amalgamation ga y mation by the ordinary methods known to the miner and were it not for the fact that a process which has recently been developed in utai utah will absolutely instantaneously and completely coin p lately recover gold b old covered with such foreign za material the history of utah alluvial placers would still go on recording za dori dormant nant properties containing it great values this condition has however now been completely changed and concentrating and recovery processes which can be successfully applied to placers containing values of such characteristics have made it possible to bring the state of utah into the gold placer producing column platinum found in utah placers it is a well vel known fact fully substantiated by the investigators vesti 6 gators of the united states 11 geological survey se see U S G S bulletin 1920 page that platinum occurs as above stated in a number of the streams of utah the writer has during the past year been brought into close touch with practically all of the known placers of utah and inasmuch as the principal object of this little essay is is to point out the placer resources of the state the following approximate locations of placers and their characteristics acte are listed here beginning with the green river in northeastern utah interesting valuable and extensive areas of placer ground are found close to the river banks near jensen and a little farther south in the well known horseshoe bend of the green river other deposits exist near the town of ouray on the green river and on almost every clearly defined bar on the green river right to its junction with the grand river at cataract canyon at this point the grand and the green come together to form the colorado and a further string of interesting placers is found at numerous places from here south to the arizona border on the grand river just south of the town of cisco on the denver rio grande western railroad in grand county there is a series of placers containing relatively large values and extending 6 all the way south from cisco again to cataract canyon where the grand joins the green placer gold sources diverse the dolores river likewise which comes into the grand gran d below cisco and which is a stream river from the east just of far greater magnitude than is generally known is also gold bearing although the gold which it brings to the grand and colorado river comes fr from 0 in a different source than that which is brought down to the colorado by the green and the grand the same canie statement holds for the san juan river farther south these represent the principal alluvial placer deposits of of the state to which should be added of course bingham bin 0 hain canyon A which is a typical gold placer area and from which according Z to public records more than one million dollars in gold has been extracted since 1865 the typical elti vial placers are found in grand county wayne county and garfield county having b their sources in the henry mountains and the lasal mountains in every case in utah so far as known these placers owe their origin b to erosion of the b gold bearing za ledges contained in in mountains mentioned which eroded material has descended the slopes and found lodgment in more or less level areas in the foothills or on the slopes themselves such short distances has this material traveled that it still often shows adhering to the particles of gold small particles of the ledge b quartz itself thus establishing beyond any question its origin and its nearness to its source matter found in a number of cases as pointed out above this material has settled down on the surface of hi high h mesas where no water reaches it except that due to precipitation in other cases small streamlets stream lets flow through the value bear int ing area or alongside of it but their action has not yet been of sufficient duration to carry the values much beyond the immediate territory thoroughly typical of such an placer is the area traversed by a little stream known as crescent creek in garfield county toward which the eroded matter from froin the b gold bearing t henry mountain ledges 6 is working its way toward the colorado the values contained in this area are quite rich but the characteristics of the gold are such that it does not lend lind itself to ordinary amalgamation anial garnation processes for recovery and as a consequence the values have lain undisturbed notwithstanding standing the fact that knowledge of their existence dates back for a considerable nur number riber of years during b the past year after the recovery process for r rusty us lyv gold above mentioned had become generally known this little stream together with the area traversed by it ha has been literally plastered with placer claims and active preparation is being made by a considerable number of operators for the recovery of the values therein contained the tremendous latent value of the gold and platinum placers of utah may be inferred from the fact that a recent careful investigation of the areas near jensen utah on the green river made by an associate of the writer has developed the fact that this restricted area alone covering not more than a few thousand acres of dredging area contains very conservatively estimated values in excess of fifteen million dollars when the numerous other similar areas traversed by the green the grand and the colorado are listed and tabulated there is no hazard in making the statement that literally hundreds of millions of dollars of values in 6 gold old and platinum in placer deposits are embraced within the confines of the state of utah |