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Show UTAH'S IROX MIXES RANK WITH THE BEST IX COUNTRY That Utah will ultimately rank as one of the largest, if not the largest, producer of iron ore on the North American continent is the belief of iron and steel experts, geologists and all others interested In the mining of iron ore and the production of iron and steel products. As a sequel to Utah's taking ranlt as a producer of iron ore in enormous enor-mous quantities, local fuel experts and industrial men interested in the manufacturing and commercial development de-velopment of Salt Lake look for Salt Lake to become the seat of. huge steel and iron manufacturing endeavor. Ultimately, -they declare, this city should see the erection of a smelter and the development of a large business busi-ness in the manufacture of rails, I-beams I-beams and all structural materials. "The Utah deposits are unquestionably unques-tionably the largest undeveloped known iron ore bodies on the North American continent," said Charles H. Gibbs, geologist for the Utah Fuel company, yesterday, in discussing the iron ore of Utah. Estimate Totals Millions The Utah iron ore occurs in the Pinto Iron and Iron Springs mining districts and the principal owners of the ore bodies are the Colorado Fuel & Iron company, Walker Bros, of Salt Lake, the S. B. Milner estate of this city, and Thomas F. Keeley .of Chicago. The experts estimate that the actual tonnage of Bessemer ore now in sight in the Utah deposits vary all the way from 50,000,000 tons to 500,000,000 tons. "It is undoubtedly safe to assume that there are at least 200000,000 tons of Bessemer ore now developed and available which can be mined at a very low cost," continued Mr. Gibbs. "It should cost say 50 to 55 cents per ton to mine. In fact, a great deal of the iron can be handled by steam shovel, and ordinary caving and stoping systems can be used successfully." suc-cessfully." Statements said to have been made by Salt Lakers and others that the iron in Utah is low grade, poor quality, quali-ty, difficult to mine, etc., are denied by Mr. Gibbs, who has made an exhaustive ex-haustive study of the state's iron ore deposits. He declares that a great bulk of the iron ore is Bessemer in quality, running 58 to 60 per cent metallic iron. An average of samples sam-ples taken of various iron ore bodies which are estimated to .have at least SO. 000, 000 tons of ore in sight, show .04 per cent phosphorous and G0.& per cent iron. Quality Equals Superior At the present time in the Lake Superior district 51 per cent ore is the standard for purchase, with a premium for every per cent of iron above' that amount, and ore as low as 4 0 per cent with a high silica content con-tent is being shipped. Thus it will be seen that Utah iron ore is of as high a standard as that from the famous Lake Superior fields, and even better than the standard there. According to local fuel and mining experts and capitalists Seattle has succeeded in interesting the Jackling interests in the development of Iron ore in that territory and the location of a plant on the Pacific coast somewhere some-where tributary to that city. The deal is understood to contemplate the expenditure of some twenty million mil-lion dollars. That it would be a laudable thing for the Salt Lake Commercial club and other public spirited organizations organiza-tions and citizens to make a strong effort to have the Utah iron fields developed and a plant located in the immediate vicinity of Salt Lake is the belief of all interested in the future fu-ture development of this city. The expenditure of such an amount as. the Jackling interests contemplate in the northwest, with the erection of a steel plant, would mean immense revenues f.. all Utah interests in the opinion of the local experts. Market Ts Enormous , At present there is a market for 300 tons of pig iron per day in the local territory, and on the Pacific coast at least twelve to fifteen thousand thou-sand tons per day. Two factors, those interested in the Utah iron fields say, must be considered con-sidered in the development of this industry; first, the natural inertia of capital in investing in new territory for such an enterprise as this, and second, the powerful influence exerted ex-erted on 'banking interests by the present intrenched steel companies to. prevent the development of competition com-petition in fields in which they are not interested. The influence of these interests is undoubtedly such that in years past they have prevented prevent-ed the development of Utah iron. The present tremendous demand for iron products of all kinds, coupled coup-led with good local influence, should go a long way toward helping to get this" enterprise under way. Utah will not get the benefit of such a plant-without plant-without strenuous competition from the Los Angeles and San . Francisco territory for the location of a steel plant in that territory instead of In Utah. It is quite likely either of the California cities would provide a free site for the plant, and a large cash bonus to have it located so that they would obtain the benefit of such an industry. m The iron ore fields can readily be reached by either the Salt Lake Route or the Denver & Rio Grande. These railroads would either bring the ore into Salt Lake valley for smelting or send It to the Pacific coast. There is not sufficient water, etc., available anywhere in the vicinity vicin-ity of the iron ore deposits to warrant war-rant locating a plant In the iron field proper. The geology shows that the principal Utah ore occurs along the contact of diorite with blue limestone. lime-stone. The larger deposits of ore are limonite in character and occur as bedded deposits in the lime extending ex-tending from the eruptive contact. However, there are large dikes of iron found In the eruptive. The probabilities are that the blue limestone lime-stone belongs to the carboniferous formation, although the only identification identi-fication heretofore had been one or two single fossils, indicating slightly j that it might be Silurian in age. Very large shoots of iron are found the I entire length of the diorite limestone i contact, which has been developed for a distance of some fourteen to sixteen miles. Herald-Republican. |