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Show HIE com ffiEiis m Extensive Deposits Were Developed by Ancient People of Mexico. "A land whose stones are iron and out of wlio.se hills thou niayest dig brass." This trite say i n g i s fro i n t a e book of holy writ, and even the agnostic will admit its truth after he has wandered over the hills and vales of old Mohave and gleaned a knowledge of its vast mineralized areas. While this is not an isolated excerpt i from the sayings of holy men, it contains much that is meat from the standpoint j of geology and mineralogy, especially to ' geologic conditions in Mohave county, i Arizona. This county stands peculiarly j alone in the geological areas of the state, , and for that matter, the whole southwest. , Even in the days when the scouts of the I Aztec chieftain, Montezuma, were search- ing the vast territory from the City of Mexico to far into what is now the state of Nevada, they left their indelible mark on the mineral zones of tills county. Along the almost impassable trails through the mountain fastnesses and along the Colorado river may be found their "milestones' and directions to water holes and living springs that those who followed them might not perish on the way. And everywhere may be found evidences of their crude mining operations, opera-tions, where they recovered from the earth gold, silver, copper and turquoise with which to embellish the persons and palaces of their autocratic masters. That the placer gold mines of the entire territory ter-ritory were known to this race and" that they profited thereby Is in evidence everywhere, every-where, but owing to the awful visitation of the conqueror, Cortez, these mines were covered, so far as possible, and it was death to reveal their whereabouts. AVhlle Colonel Pat Donan did not live in the days when Humboldt paid his visit to the mineral domain of the west, he still had Hum bold t cheated for words with which to give clarity to the mineral situation situa-tion as he saw it. Said Colonel Donan: "The greatest mines of the earth are yet to be opened in the great American west. Mountains of gold and silver ore, beside which all the famed riches of the Corns tock lode will some day sink to beggar's pence, yet rear their proud heads to heaven untouched by pick or spade or drill. The veritable treasure houses of the gods yet await the enterprise and the muscle of the sturdy prospectors and miners, who are destined, and ere long, to fire the avarice and envy of the world with their midas-surpassing wealth of solid ducats. From Alaska to Nicaragua, the whole vast system of Rocky mountains moun-tains and Cordilleras is an unbroken ore and mineral bed. INot one ten-thousandth part of it has ever felt the tap of a prospector's pros-pector's hammer. The surface dirt of California. Colorado, Utah, Montana, Arizona Ari-zona and New Mexica mines is hardly broken; the glittering hoards are scarcely touched. The great bonanza fortunes are yet to be made." Colonel Pat Donan was a gifted writer and he jnade this prophecy in Salt Lake Citv more than a quarter of a century ago. He made it with his large knowledge knowl-edge of the vast undeveloped areas of the states and his absolute belief in the prospector and the miner to give part of this vast mineral to the world that it might be poured into the channels of trade and commerce. He knew the educating edu-cating influence of mineral production on the world at large and that greater and greater would be the search for the bidden wealth as the - years went, by. Since his dav the great mines of Tonopah and Goldfield have been brought in and Arizona has passed from seventh place in the production of copper into first place, from which position she will never be displaced. Mo nave Record. |
