OLD SUMMERVILLE DISTRICT
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The Emery County Camp Shows
Signs of a Revival
J. B. Taylor, the well known mining engineer and chemist, has returned from an extended trip into the old Summerville Mining District in Emery County, where he has been engaged in making some exhaustive examinations of the geological conditions as found in that section.
The above named district, according to what Mr. Taylor has to say, was established in 1881. About that time some large deposits of silver, lead, copper and gold ores were discovered in the sandstone formations, but the ores proved not to be sufficient high grade to pay the expenses necessary to conduct it to the valley smelters. The distance from the mines to the smelters was about 150 miles, and the only means of transportation at the time was by wagons. The building of the Rio Grande Western later removed all these difficulties, but when the old conditions prevailed the country was almost entirely abandoned.
During the last few months, however, signs of prosperity have put in an appearance, and Mr. Taylor says the country is becoming active with every indication that the camp will become the most productive in the state after it has been sufficiently developed.
The main ore veins in the district run from the east to the west and generally dip towards the north at an angle of sixty-five degrees. The character of the ores at the surface is a bromide, sulphide and chloride of silver, while the copper deposits lie in the form of halco pyrite, malachite and oxides, frequently associated with copper in the native form.
At the property owned by the Copper Boy Mining Company, numerous openings have been made on the surface where the ore crops out. The development work done consists of shafts and open cuts and in no place, Mr. Taylor states, has the vein been found to be barren. Assays taken from the surface ores have shown values ranging from 2 5/8 percent copper, 26 ounces silver, and 5 percent lead to 28 percent copper, 198 ounces silver, $7 gold , with traces of lead. The vein ranges from six to twenty feed wide, and the paystreak measuring from four to thirty-two inches in width, lies between a quartzite footwall, a line hanging and a siliciouos gangue.
No depth of any consequence has been attained as yet, the deepest workings being not to exceed thirty feet, but all the developments done have been made in ore from the surface.
On the Sheep Ranch, owned by ex- Sheriff Harvey Hardy and others, which lies a half mile from the Copper King, the same vein appears, while the formation is some different, there being a dolomite lime foot and a blue lime hanging wall, strongly impregnated with iron. The group consists of three claims.
Louis Presset owns a promising group adjoining the Sheep Ranch on the south. There are five claims in all, and shows up values in copper ranging from 5 to 29 percent, silver ranging from five and a half to 300 ounces, and gold from 40 cents up to $4.
Further on to the south Dr. Dart of Salt Lake owns a group of patented claims lying in a sandstone formation.. Assays taken have shown the ore to contain values, Mr. Taylor asserts, from $40 to $100 to the ton, this of course is not an average.
The Midland group, located at the head of Stowe's Canyon, has a true fissure vein exposed of a good width, with a favorable showing of pay ore on the footwall, carrying copper values as high as 25 1/2 percent, gold up to $7 and silver up to 196 ounces to the ton. The property is situated about six miles from Cedar Station and ten miles from Lower Crossing on the Rio Grande Western Railway.
The country is conveniently located close to fuel and water while ample water power for all purposes can be made available from the Price River. The country is contiguous to a good farming community, and supplies from that source can be gotten cheaply.
Salt Lake Herald
September 27, 1899
