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Show IRON FOUND NEAR THIS CJTY Don aiagulre in his address before the real estate men at their dinner at the Weber club last Monday, presented present-ed the following as reasons why an iron industry should be established in Ogden: Iron Ore In Northern Utah. The Iron fields of Utah are confined con-fined to two Important areas, one of which contains an area of about one hundred square miles in Iron county, and another field covering considerable' considera-ble' parts of Morgan, Cache. Weber and Box Elder counties and covering an area of about two hundred and seventy square miles The area of the southern Utah Iron fields consist entirely en-tirely of magnetic and hematite ores, while the northern field contains exclusively ex-clusively bodies of hematite specular and limonite ore The regions in northern Utah I will touch upon in a general way in this paper, as it is the field with which Ogden, Salt I-ake and vicinity will have to do in the course of time The northern iron bearing area at one time comprised a bed of iron varying in thickness from ten to one hundred feet, lying immediately above the Silurian limestone and under un-der a capping of chloritic slate on which in turn rested a measure of Weber quartzite, about one thousand feet in thickness at many points With the upraising of what is now known as Jhc Wasatch range of mountains moun-tains the origin.il plain became distorted, dis-torted, folded and broken, exposing at many points the iron measure of tills great field. We will first mention the exposure as formed near Willard, where we see the measure exposed in the Barker mines at what was once known as the Mormon Girl lode, and In other mining min-ing claims in that district the vein along its exposures shows great strength and a thickness of from ten to seventy feet It rises from the edge of the valley along a transverse which follows upward until the summit sum-mit of the Sierra Madre mountains is reached, and where this iron measure meas-ure shows a thickness of over 1G0 feet at a point about eight hundred feet higher than the silver-lead workings work-ings of Eldorado mine at aa altitude of about 9,500 feet above sea level. At this point the exposure of this Iron measure pitches to the southeastward, south-eastward, showing exposures and from time to time above the surface for a distance of about twenty-five mile?, where it is prominent as an exhibit of hematite iron ore near the Van Patten Pat-ten mines in Argenta district, Morgan Mor-gan county and from that point It courses southward and southeastward showing Its outcrop from time to time until we reach ttard Scrabble district In Morgan or Davis county, where immense im-mense masses of high-grade superior iron ore are exposed above the surface. sur-face. From Hard Scrabble to the southeastward south-eastward there Is some evidence of continuation of this great iron measure, meas-ure, but not distinct for a great distance, dis-tance, as there is much drift and talus and its evidence soon dies out In that direction. The south base line of this Iron field runs car of south for a distance dis-tance of about thirty-five miles or from Willard to Hard Scrabble. From Willard the measure of Iron ore is exposed ex-posed at many points In the spur of mountains that separated Cache from Ogden valley and along this course for a distance of about twenty miles there are seen at different points the outcrops of thiee kinds, which outcrops out-crops arc the anticlinal measure dipping dip-ping under Ogden valley and folding near the base of Wolf Peak over In Cache county north and northwest of old La Plata lead camp. There are several prominent ex posures of iron ore bodies along the breaks of one of these measures and it is one of these on which some work was done years ago by Congressman Howell of Cache county, Utah. So that as to the area of the Iron fields of northern Utah it .may be placed :tt 20 miles in width and 3fi miles In length, thus covering an area of 700 square miles Of course much of this area indicates that erosion has done much to eliminate the iron measure, but it is safe to state that Iron abounds in quantity and of superior quality under 500 square miles of the above area and in cutting it down to the prominent exposures we find about two hundred and seventy square miles of iron territory A remarkable fea-turo fea-turo of this field is that they are re-markedly re-markedly free from elements injurious to the manufacture of superior Iron and steel, sulphur, titanium, phosphorous phos-phorous and arsenic being absent, no doubt the origin of this tremendous area of iron may be accounted for by the presence at one time of immense bodies of pyrite but the precipitation and formation of the present iron measures here show no sulphur at anv point where examination has been made. The existence of this field was known as far fack as 1SG0 especially at Willard, are for fluxing silver lead 01 es was shipped to Sandy and Cottonwood Cot-tonwood smelters, south of Salt Lake City, during the seventies, and about the year 1S80 an iron plant was built at Ogden by a local company and iron smeltecl In ton pigs to the amount of about two hundred tons. This iion tas used for castings at the Salt Lake foundries and some of it sent to San Francisco and elsewhere, at all of which points it received hichest praiso for its superior quality. At about this time a certain railway company became be-came interested in the manufacture of iron in an adjoining state and its rep-leseutalive rep-leseutalive became interested up to the control of the Ogden plant and promptly shut it down. It soon went to ruin and at this date only the tail race and a few large pieces of casting cast-ing are left to give testimony to the Bmotherlng of an infant industry at Ogden. Tho ores used at this iron Btnelter were taken from Willard whore a large out-crop of hemitlto shows In tho Barker iron mines and a part of it from a deposit of limonite Iron situated In Willard canjon and some was also taken fiom Strawberry and from Hard Scrabble in Morgan county. The limestone for fluxing was taken from Ogden canyon and also in part from Talors canyon and the experimental work so done proved that Utah Iron ores are adapted to tho production ofiron of the hibhest grade, but It also proved that the time was not then pronitflous lor the establishment of such an Industry In Utah. This was not the first iron made in Utah, for at Iron City some distance west of Cedar City, "in Iron county, Utah, Iron was produced in the sixties, castings of many kinds being made there. The writer of this report saw fire-dogs and smoothing irons and other houscholcl utensils made there In those days and in pattern and material ma-terial they were excellent. As far as the experience and investigation in-vestigation of the writer goes It can be stated that the finest ores of Utah He in the northern field and as to the quantity to be drawn upon In this field estimates vary from 500,000,000 to 7,000,000,000, tho latter amount being a liberal estimate as to quantity that this region could afford to the sraeltiug industry As to the percentage percent-age of iron present In the ore, It runs from 20 to C4 per cent; the gieat body of the ore is found associated with the chloritic slates and In the limestone lime-stone measures; adjacent we find Immense Im-mense deposits of limonite ores that no doubt originated from the decomposition decom-position of the adjacent hermatite ores in the nearby green slates. Very much of this ore lies In localities lo-calities difficult of access on account of the abrupt uprise of the country, for example; a great part of that In the highlands of the Sierra Madre mountains, and yet even from thero It can be removed by tramway to the valley below. At Willard on the Cache Valley divide, at Argenta, Strawberry, and at Hard Scrabble, the approach to these groat out-crops Is easy The northwest exposures of this field, part of which shows prominently In one great uplift near Eldorado Peak shows the measure prominently and tho thickness of the measure at that point Is about from seventy-five to ono hundred foot, Immediately west of this, along the line of faulting bq tho mountain base. Wo find, at Utah Hot Springs, seven miles northwest of Ogden a largo deposit of limonite Iron, no doubt comes from the deep seated ore 'field that lies burled west of tlio line of faulting and whieh Is situated at a debt of about 4,000 feet below the surface tho hot waters disintegrating dis-integrating it and bringing It in solutions so-lutions to the surface. That the above iron field, Ib one of the principal onos of the world admits ad-mits of no doubt and that it must in timo become a conspicuous and profitable prof-itable producer Is equally true Much of It lies in an area seldom visited by those Interested in mining, as ores hitherto used for fluxing silver, lead and copper ores in Utah, the iron has been taken from the Dragon mine at Tmtic and from other small deposits in Tooele, Sait Lake and Utah counties, coun-ties, at some points the ores of this field are associated with a high percentage per-centage of manganese, this is true of the iron ore that lies at the east base of the Sierra Madre mountain, in Ogden Og-den valley the ore crops arc along tho base of the foothills nnd with this part of the great measure manganese is abundant The highest grade ore is found northeast of Willard nnd in those outcrops out-crops of the great vein along Cache Valley divided in this same part of the field the ore can be mined at very little expense. Again, at times, the ores found here show a good deal of copper carbonates in blue and green, indicating the presence of bodies bod-ies of chalcopyrltc at greater depth. To the development of such Indications, Indica-tions, little attention has been given and It is very likely that the great merit of this" field lies In the iron measure which at no great distance in time is destined to become the theater of extensie activity in mining these ores for manufacture Into iron and steel. Iron In Utah hitherto has been much as it was in the Lake Superior regions seventy-five years ago, or copper ores in I'tah mountains. Arizona Ariz-ona and California, forty years ago In those days neither zinc nor copper was wanted by any one as they were not industrial features, but each of these metals came to Its own in its respective locality and so likewise will iron oro in Utah. Thirty years ago tho Utah min at Bingham "could bo bought up for ton thousand dollars, but men said the copper Is too low in percentage to ever bo of value to mine Today, that mine turns out daily 14.000 tons of ore and Is easily worth $20,000,000. other copper mines of our state orth less thirty years since, are today bonanzas. So likewise like-wise will It be -without Iron: today of little value and unworked. Twenty years hence they will have become assets representing millions of dollars. dol-lars. The electric smelting of iron ores has been started in California, it is I said to bo in every way a success. With this same source of power in Utah. Ogden or possibly Salt Lake City, might easily become the center of iron and steel production for about 500,000 square miles of territory and employ from 1.000 to 2.000 persons in tho work. That this Industry will ultimately ul-timately be built up In Utah there can be no doubt, but just how soon depends de-pends largely upon how soon the people peo-ple of Utah will assert themselves in contending for a part of the empire of trade and manufacture in the groat Held that lies west of tho Rocky mountains. As to tho cost of production In Utah iron and steel should come forth from the furnace cheaply as can he mado In Colorado, in Indiana, or Pennsylvania. Pennsyl-vania. Coking coal and lime stone are abundant at our doors and as to electrical power, few slates hae n more abundant or convenient supplv than Utah. So that all that the Iron industry yet requires In Utah is brains nerve and monoy. |