PRICES.
Consul McFarland,0
of Reichenberg, reports the prices of rough tourmaline in Austria, as
given early in the year by a reliable manufacturing jeweler, as
follows:
Prices per pound of rough tourmaline in Austria in 1906.
Small pink, green, and blue................................................. 832
Green, larger size.......................................................... 160
Very large green and blue.................................................. 320
Very large pink, extra.................................................____ 640
These
values are given as approximate, since the price varies with the
demand, especially in America, and was rather low at the time mentioned.
TURQUOISE.
ARIZONA AND NEW MEXICO.
Some
of the turquoise deposits near Mineral Park, Ariz., were visited during
the year by Mr. F. C. Schrader, of this Survey, who furnished the
material for the following notes:
Turquoise was discovered near Mineral Park about 1885 by James Haas. t As
in New Mexico, the deposits had been worked by the Aztecs, as evidenced
by the old tunnels and drifts in which were found stone axes and other
tools.
The
mines are located on both Ithaca Peak, nearly a mile southeast of
Mineral Park, and on Turquoise Mountain, about a mile southwest of the
town. The turquoise occurs in an altered quartz porphyry in veins and
in solid rock, mostly in kidneys or globular bodies from 1 to 6 or 8
inches in diameter. The lumps are in places connected by mere seams or
stringers or are entirely isolated in solid rock.
Two
Los Angeles companies and the Aztec Turquoise Company, of New York, are
interested in the Mineral Park turquoise deposits. They all own claims
on either Ithaca Peak or Turquoise Mountain or on both. The Aztec
Company owns nine claims, which it has operated intermittently during
the last five years.
Some
of the mines are located on the east slope of Ithaca Peak, about 150
feet below the top, at an elevation of about 4,700 feet above sea
level, or 800 feet above Mineral Park. They are reached by a burro
trail from the camp at the foot of the mountain, and there is a good
wagon road from Mineral Park to the camp. The workings consist mostly
of open pits and cuts, rarely over 25 feet deep, and a few short
tunnels.
The
turquoise occurs sporadically in the rock, with a tendency to follow
veins, fissures, seams, etc. The country rock is a highly altered
feldspathic rock whose nature has not been definitely determined,
consisting, in its present condition, chiefly of quartz. The latter
mineral occurs in interlacing veinlets and stringers with pea-sized
balls, probably original phenocrysts, in a finer matrix. Kaolinization
of the original feldspar of the rocks has been extensive, with an
accompanying production of sericite or some silvery mica and the liberation of much
silica. This has left the rocks porous in places and more compact in
others, where much secondary quartz has been deposited.
