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Show in several places in Coal Creek canyon can-yon and is seen in many outcropping3 east as far as Orderville. It is approximately ap-proximately five feet thick on an average. No doubt the same vein extends ex-tends westward from the fault plane just east of Cedar City but is buried too deep for one to determine the thickness or extent. While this coal has supplied Iron county and to a limited extent Washington county, with coal from the working of four or five mines in Coal Creek canyon and the Kanarra mountain, since the first settlement of Utah, yet there has been no extensive development of the vein to the present time. In the south end of this county, in the vicinity of New Harmony, there are three distinct veins of coal extending ex-tending into Washington county from Iron county. At this place the great intrusions of andesite forming the Pine valley mountain and the mountains moun-tains northward have converted the bituminous coal into an anthracite. Eastward, extending from Iron county into Kane county, there is a vein of cannel coal approximately six feet thick. This coal is comparatively comparative-ly rare and used chiefly for the making mak-ing of bricketts, burning in open grates and producing gas. No development de-velopment work has been done on this coal and at present it is too far from a rail road to be of commercial value. Beneath the coal a few hundred feet and outcropping on the face of Cedar mountain is a great body of the best quality of gypsum. The stratum of this mineral seems to be coextensive with the coal. In coal Creek canyon and within two miles of Cedar City the gypsum is completely exposed in many places, all of the overbearing rock having been completely erroded away. This deposit will not remain neglected much longer. In the mountains extending from Newcastle northward, lead, silver, gold and copper are found in a great many different places. None of these veins have been developed to any e"xfejvt except the property of J. R. Richards and his associates. The best deposit of gold yet discovered discov-ered in Iron county is found at state line. Here there was considerable activity about twenty five years ago, but the camp was abandoned without half testing cut the field. The gold occurs there at the contract of two igneous intrusions, one a rhyolitic porphyry and the other a more basic rock, but I haven't examined it carefully care-fully enough to know just what it is. The gold found in this camp was of very high grade. We have limestone and building stone of unlimited quantities and of good quality, both, of which, are easily eas-ily accessable, and none of which is used to any appreciable extent. Shale and gravel lie at our door. This material makea excellent surface for roads and has already been used to a considerable extent in building the roads of this county. On several occasions oc-casions over two hundred loads per day of this material has been put on the streets of Cedar City by voluntary volun-tary service. Potash and phosphates are found to some extent m the strata east of Ce- (Contmued On Page Four.)" Minerals of Iron County JOHN M. FOSTER Attorney at Law, Cedar City, Utah. There is no locality any where to be found that offers a better opportunity for the study of pure geology than the region extending from Cedar City southward to the bottom of the Grand canyon of the Colorado. And there is no other locality of the same dimensions dimen-sions which contains a greater variety of minerals of economic value than does Iron county. Yet both of these fields have been almost wholly neglected ne-glected until the past few years. Aside from the great bodies of iron ore in the Iron mountain distinct and Bxtending westward into the Bull valley val-ley district, we have m this county and extending into Kane county, a great bodv of bituminous coal covering cover-ing six hundred square miles of ground. This vein of coal outcrops near the top of the Cedar mountain just east of Cedar City, appears again J ' ;' P 4 I ' i - - - - . t - t - , , , , A 4 ' ' - . . ' " t 1 " ' 4 ; vJ ' " ), r , .... - i . . ' " ' ' Coartcsy Zion Studio Tourist Camp, Cedar City. Minerals of Iron County (Continued from Page One) ' dar City, but probably in not sufficient richness to pay for shipment. These minerals, however, have helped to nake up the soil of Cedar valley, which is not surpassed by any soil to be found on the continent. Whether there is any oil in this county remains to be discovered. We know we have some oil formations and the residium of oil outcrops in Fiddlers Fid-dlers canyon and in Coal Creek canyon but as yet no holes have been put down. The country is pretty well faulted and broken up except in Cedar valley and westward into the Escalante Es-calante valley. In these places it would seem would be most favorable for wells. According to statistics from several sources, mainly that of the United States government, the iron ore body found in Iron county is the largest known in the world today. Its dimensions di-mensions are twenty-four miles north and south and six to eight miles east and west. Surface showings at what is known as Iron Springs, Lindsay Hill, Desert Mound, and the Three Peaks, just twelve miles west of Cedar City, indicate in-dicate that there is an unlimited quantity. quan-tity. Diamond drill tests have been made in the district mentioned shows the depth of the ore to be in the neighborhood of 600 feet, and at that depth is pregnateated quite heavily with copper. In the Iron mountain and "Blow Out" district of the iron ore belt the surface showing are equal if not larger than in the first mentioned district. The "Blow Out" surface showing is purely a mountain of ore of a very high quality, tests having proven that the ore runs from 4S per cent pure iron to 78 per cent. In the Iron Springs district the iron content of the ore averages 43 per cent but. is of a Verv hip-h p-rnde Tn fnrf it is claimed that the ore from this section makes the best bessemer steel, and is coveted by the corporations who use iron in the manufacture of their products. This vast body of ore remained undeveloped un-developed until four years ago when the advent of the railroad from Lund to Cedar brought on a stimulus in the iron development through the Columbia Steel corporation which erected a large smelting plant at Ironton, near Provo City, "Utah. The completion of this iron plant forced the Columbia steel to do a great deal of development work, and the company com-pany opened up large workings in Iron Springs, mining the ore by the 'Glory Hole" process, on an average of 1000 tons oer day, shipped to Ironton. Finally last year the Columbia Sfeel decided to add a second unit to the plant at Ironton, which again necessitated neces-sitated great development, and a deal was made by this company with the Milner interests, owners of the Desert Mound property, a large hill of ore of high grade, capped only with a small covering of limestone. At the Desert Mound the second ore crushing machine was erected, which is the second largest ore crusher in the United States. Temporarily the Columbia steel is shipping ore daily from the Desert Mound while repairs and further "stripping" of ore is going on at Iron Springs, and a new camp and shipping ground being got ready at Iron mountain, so that sufficient tonnagn per day can be had to supply the first and second units of the smelting plant at Ironton. The ore of this section is also used for fluxing purposes in the great smelters of precious ores in Northern Utah, and it has proven to be the best found in the inter-mountain west. The development so far done is only a small beginning, if reports current are to lie relied upon. The Colorado Fuel & Iron, with large holdings, the United States Steel, the Pacific Coast Steel, and other, are working to the end for further development of the ore, the claim being the Pacific Coast manufacturers are desirous of securing secur-ing the ore for their purposes as it ranks higher in quality than any known in all of West United States. ' - ! T x I . . Courtoay R. D. Adnms Studio Cedar City Grade School. |
