Historic Pennsylvania Gold Mine and Mill
80 Acre Lode Claim Argentine District
Summit County, ColoradoContact Gold Rush Expeditions
Use code JRM1003 for a 10% discount.
www.goldrushexpeditions.com
Ph: 385-218-2138
Email: goldrush@goldrushexpeditions.com
Gold Rush Expeditions, Inc. is proud to present the Historic Pennsylvania Gold Mining Claims for Sale. The Pennsylvania is a collection of lode mining claims covering over 80 acres of lands for sale exclusively through Gold Rush Expeditions, Inc. The Mines are located just outside of Keystone, Colorado and have been properly staked and marked at all corners. All Gold Rush Expeditions, Inc. claims have been meticulously surveyed, mapped and researched. Field work is completed by our own experienced, well versed Mine Survey Team.
This is an incredible and historic mine. This claim is incredibly easy to drive to and has ample parking and staging. The Pennsylvania was a huge gold producer with trace lead, zinc, iron and copper also produced. It has a long and detailed history and made millionaires out of many investors prior to 1941.
The mine was closed due to the War Act in 1941 and never recovered. Many investors and companies purchased and sold rights to the mines but there is no record of it being commercially mined since that time.
From 2012 to 2016, overzealous conservationists and environmental radicals spent millions of dollars in public funds to re-structure and re-shape the mountain. The scare of harmless orange water overtook common sense. The idiots, who were unable to learn from past mistakes, have placed bulkhead plugs in the lower levels to block the scary orange water. Lets not discuss this is the same way that the Gold King was closed up and we saw how well that worked.
There are beautiful gold and pyrite ores on quartz all over the site. Waste dumps could potentially hold millions of dollars in unworked gold. As to the reclamation, the result is some very nice roads up to the mine portals and some excellent culverted and shored portals that would have cost a claim owner many thousands of dollars to install. This CERCLA, State and County effort in no way mitigates any mining rights or opportunities. As the laws state, nothing in the act or the intent of the fund will impede legal mining operations.
The mine is historically mapped to a six portal maze of tunnels. These 6 adits allowed access to the mine on multiple levels. With this info it is still easy to assumed there are other levels inside the mine that remain unmapped. The two portals on the claim are secured by heavy steel doors and do a great job at keeping curious onlookers out of the mine. There are several buildings on the claim including the old mill, tipple and a tram house where ore was separated and shipped down the mountain to the mill. There are also many crumbling old cabins and outhouses throughout the forest. The claim has one rock structure that has all walls intact and would just need a roof to be useable. The tram house and tipple are in fairly good repair. The Mill is in need of some work but does have some irreplaceable milling components still in place such as the boiler, ball crusher, ore separator/mover.
This mine should be noted as a commercial site and operation. It will require a notice of operation to be worked. There will be permitting required to restore the mine to its previous operational state. The mine can be drilled, sampled and surveyed with minimal permitting to identify high grade zones of interest. Gold Rush can assist with your permitting and legal council. If you would like more information please call our office during normal business hours.
History of the Mines
The Pennsylvania mine is on the northwest slope of Decatur Mountain, about a quarter of a mile south of Peru Creek and 3 miles east-northeast of Montezuma. It has been one of the most productive mines in the quadrangle and has a large mill run by electric power and several smaller buildings for living quarters and offices. The mine is easily accessible by automobile over a good wagon road, which has few steep grades. The mill and the mine buildings are at an altitude of about 10,900 feet and are connected with the two main openings of the mine by short aerial tram lines.
The vein was discovered by J. M. Hall in 1879 and slowly but steadily developed by him and his associates during the next decade. Almost no ore was shipped until about 1887, but from this year until 1893 the production of the mine increased steadily from a few carloads to nearly 7,000 tons a year; from 1894 to 1907 the mine was active, but production gradually fell off, and in 1908 no ore was shipped. The production has been intermittent since 1909 and has fluctuated greatly; thus over 12,000 tons of ore was treated in 1911, less than 50 tons the next year, and about 3,000 tons in 1913. Early in 1892 the mine was leased by the original owners, J. M. Hall, R. S. Morison, B. A. Hopkins, C. N. Foster, and J. H. Husted, to the Decatur Mining Syndicate, Ltd., an English organization, which operated the property during the peak of its production but disposed of it in 1895 to the Pennsylvania Mines Co., which held it for several years. The ore sold prior to 1894 was sorted by hand and shipped directly to the smelters, but in 1895 a mill was completed, and almost all the ore sold since that time has been concentrated in the mill, which has been revamped several times. In 1902 the Ohio Mines Co. bought the property and drove the lowest level on the vein, known as the Ohio or F level. The mine again changed hands in 1905 and was held by the New Pennsylvania Mines Co. until 1918; it was then taken over by the Liberty Mining & Reduction Co. and operated by that company until 1927, when the company was reorganized as the Consolidated Pennsylvania Mining Co.
The mine is opened by six levels, known as A, B, C, D, E, and F. Level A is the highest and is 30 feet above level B but is not connected with it. Both are adits but have long been caved. Level C, 130 feet below level B, is opened by an adit whose portal is at an altitude of 11,290 feet and is connected to the mill by an aerial tram. It was the level through which the mine was operated for many years, and a winze sunk on the vein from this level was used for opening levels D and E, 50 and 130 feet below level C. Level F was opened by another adit and is about 100 feet below level E, its portal having an altitude of 11,058 feet. The geology and the plan of the accessible workings are shown in plate 33.
The Pennsylvania vein strikes N. 20°-35° E. and averages about N. 30° E. It dips steeply to the west in most places but locally overturns and dips about 80° E. The vein is chiefly in schistose rocks a few hundred feet east of the Montezurna quartz monzonite stock. (See pi. 3.) The most common rocks on the lowest level of the vein are quartz schist, quartz-biotite schist, injection gneiss, and granite gneiss. Locally thin dikes of Silver Plume granite are present, and a dike of quartz monzonite is cut near the breast of the southwestern split of the vein. (See pi. 33.) On level C the prevailing wall rocks are granite gneiss and injection gneiss, but Silver Plume granite, quartz monzonite porphyry, and quartz-biotite schist are cut by the crosscut on this level. The wall rock of the vein has been markedly silicified and pyritized for a distance of 30 feet west of the vein, but east of the vein the silicification was less intense, although pyrite is abundant 20 feet away.
Only a part of level C was accessible at the time of the writers visit. The vein has been stoped for over 800 feet on this level, and the stopes are from 6 to 14 feet wide, the largest stopes being at the place where the vein divides into the east and west splits. As shown in plate 33, these two branches diverge at an angle of about 25° until they are nearly 50 feet apart and then resume the general course of the main vein, continuing parallel as far as they have been explored.
About 180 feet northeast of the split and a short distance north of the point where the level C crosscut intersects the vein a pillar of ore has been left. This ore is probably of lower grade than much of that taken from the stope but is instructive as illustrating its general mode of occurrence. The vein here is about 12 feet wide and is a strongly sheeted zone in granite gneiss. Between the walls of the sheeted zone numerous veins of galena, pyrite, chalcopyrite, and quartz seam the altered gneiss. Most of the minor veins are parallel to the walls, but several of them follow an irregular diagonal course across the sheeted zone. Galena is the most abundant mineral in the veins and occurs in seams from 1 to 12 inches wide; about 30 inches of the sheeted zone is galena, 5 inches pyrite, and 2 inches chalcopyrite. The relations of the veinlets clearly show that quartz, pyrite, and chalcopyrite are earlier than galena and that a small amount of dolomite formed later than the galena.
According to the miners some of the best ore at the split was 14 feet wide, contained less than 2 feet of waste, and carried very little pyrite. Argentiferous gray copper ore was much more abundant near the surface than in the lower workings, and according to the Georgetown Courier for September 11, 1890, when the vein was first opened large quantities of copper sulphate were found.
Level F follows the vein 1,800 feet south of the level F crosscut, and here, almost vertically below the split in level C, the vein branches. The west branch, which has been followed 300 feet farther, is apparently the main vein and shows little change from the course followed by tlie vein to this point. The east branch has been followed about 200 feet. The walls of the vein and its branches have been intensely silicified and pyritized throughout the level. The vein is smaller on this level than it is on level C, and the ore is commonly lean, pyritic, and thin, but in a few places some good lead ore occurs and stoping has been done. A few feet north of the crosscut a winze was sunk to an unknown depth in 1902, and according to Thomas Sharpe, who worked in the mine in that year, the vein carried only pyrite and quartz as far as the winze was sunk, and no drifts were turned from it. The vein is said to maintain its westerly dip to the bottom of this winze. About 350 feet south of the crosscut the first shoot of lead ore occurred in the vein on level F, although small amounts of galena were sparsely distributed in the pyritic quartz of the vein in many places north of this place. The ore shoot was about 12 inches wide and 50 feet long and, unlike the others seen, dipped steeply to the east. A short distance farther south the vein resumed its normal dip and again became pyritic. At 70 feet south of this ore body another galena ore shoot was found. The vein here was from 3 to 5 feet wide and had 12 to 30 inches of galena ore for a distance of about 100 feet along the drift. At the south end of the ore shoot a winze was sunk 75 feet. The winze was full of water at the time of the writers visit, but the vein is said to have galena ore in it as far as the winze was sunk; the maximum width of lead ore in the winze is reported to be about 24 inches, but little stoping was done below the level.
Apparently the amount of galena was not large enough to pay the cost of pumping the heavy flow of water found in the winze. At 220 feet south of the winze a short galena ore shoot was found, and a raise has been put up on the vein. At the level of the drift the vein dips 73° W.; 30 feet above it the vein becomes vertical; and 70 feet above the level it overturns and dips 85° E. The galena ore 30 feet above the drift is distributed through about 24 inches of broken sheeted rock, but 70 feet above the drift it pinches to 4 inches in width. Little ore was exposed between this ore body and the place where the vein branches. Here a short crosscut toward the west exposes a sheeted zone about 7 feet wide containing many veins and stringers of galena, which aggregate about 12 inches in width. Very little ore is exposed in the west branch, however, until a point about 140 feet farther south is reached; here an ore shoot containing both lead and copper was found, and some stoping has been done. This shoot is about 80 feet long on level F but is somewhat longer a short distance above it. Although the drift was less than a year old at the time of the writers visit, the water from the vein carried so much copper that deposits of metallic copper half an inch thick and from 3 to 7 feet long were formed in many places on the iron rails under the stope. The east branch contains very little galena but is heavily seamed with pyrite; this part of the vein is from 12 to 48 inches wide and in places carries as much as 15 inches of pyrite.
Small veins striking parallel to the Pennsylvania vein occur east of it on both levels C and F. The Ouray vein is cut 225 feet east of the Pennsylvania vein on level C. It strikes N. 30° E., dips 80° W., and carries 2 inches of galena ore. On level F a narrow vein locally stained with copper, iron, and manganese is cut about 75 feet east of the Pennsylvania vein. It has been followed about 200 feet north and south of the main crosscut but without encouraging results. About 100 feet farther east another small vein carrying calcite and pyrite was found. No other veins were discovered in this crosscut. The breast is about 400 feet east of the main vein, and there is a heavy flow of water issuing from it.
No conclusive evidence has been found regarding the direction of the pre mineral movement on the Pennsylvania fissure. Grooves and striations on the wall of the vein dip about 30° SW.; the occurrence of galena in diagonal fractures such as those shown in plate 33 suggests gash veins in a reverse fault; and the marked thinning of the northeastern ore shoot on level F where the vein steepened and overturned toward the east suggests the closing of an irregular open fissure by reverse faulting. The meager evidence available indicates that the west wall moved upward to the northeast relative to the east wall.
As shown on plate 3, the Pennsylvania vein is nearly parallel to the schistosity of the enclosing schist and gneiss. In the Central City and Idaho Springs districts deep exploration has shown that the most productive veins either cut across the schistosity of the country rock or have walls of granite gneiss, porphyry, or pegmatite.
In many veins in those districts the occurrence of ore shoots is definitely related to the occurrence of layers of granite gneiss in the Idaho Springs formation, and an apparently barren vein becomes productive on passing into granite gneiss, or a productive vein becomes barren on passing into schist. In the Montezuma district ore shoots are most commonly found in veins where the schistosity of the enclosing rock makes a decided angle with the vein, or at the intersection of two veins. The large body of ore found in the Pennsylvania vein occurs where it branches and in that part of the vein which has walls of granite gneiss. The split in the vein occurs very close to the south end of the granite gneiss wedge and suggests the weakening of the vein as it passes from the competent gneiss into the incompetent schists. The strain, which was relieved in the granite gneiss by strong fracturing confined to a narrow sheeted zone, may have been distributed over a much wider space in the weaker schists; as a result the vein may weaken and branch as it is followed into the schist. Although there is little likelihood of finding an ore body in the schist comparable to that in the gneiss, it is probable that chimneys or good ore can be found at the splits in the vein and in other favorable places. The extension of the Pennsylvania vein to the southwest has been traced in the Delaware, Delaware Extension, and Sunrise claims, but little ore has been produced here except from the Delaware. The workings on the Delaware have long been inaccessible, but their production and history are discussed on page 78. The known and estimated production of the Pennsylvania group is shown below.
The vein was discovered by J. M. Hall in 1879 and slowly but steadily developed by him and his associates during the next decade. Almost no ore was shipped until about 1887, but from this year until 1893 the production of the mine in creased steadily from a few carloads to nearly 7,000 tons a year; from 1894 to 1907 the mine was active, but production gradually fell off, and in 1908 no ore was shipped. The production has been intermittent since 1909 and has fluctuated greatly; thus over 12,000 tons of ore was treated in 1911, less than 50 tons the next year, and about 3,000 tons in 1913. Early in 1892 the mine was leased by the original owners, J. M. Hall, R. S. Morison, B. A. Hopkins, C. N. Foster, and J. H. Husted, to the Decatur Mining Syndicate, Ltd., an English organization, which operated the property during the peak of its production but disposed of it in 1895 to the Pennsylvania Mines Co., which
held it for several years. The ore sold prior to 1894 was sorted by hand and shipped directly to the smelters, but in 1895 a mill was completed, and almost all the ore sold since that time has been concentrated in the mill, which has been revamped several times. In 1902 the Ohio Mines Co. bought the property and drove the lowest level on the vein, known as the Ohio or F level. The mine again changed hands in 1905 and was held by the New Pennsylvania Mines Co. until 1918; it was then taken over by the Liberty Mining & Reduction Co. and operated by that company until 1927, when the company was reorganized as the Consolidated Pennsylvania Mining Co.
Asking Price: $600,000Contact: Gold Rush Expeditions
Use code JRM1003 for a 10% discount.
www.goldrushexpeditions.com
Ph: 385-218-2138
Email: goldrush@goldrushexpeditions.com
