838 MINERAL RESOURCES, 1914----PART I.
MINE PRODUCTION OF GOLD AND SILVER, BY STATES.
ALASKA.
It
is estimated by A. H. Brooks that the total output of gold from Alaska,
from earliest mining in 1880 to the end of 1914 has been $244,156,799,
of which $175,712,992 has come from placers. The total output of silver
has been 3,851,416 fine ounces, of which 1,494,221 ounces was derived
from the refining of placer gold and 1,462,348 ounces was recovered
from Alaskan copper ores.1
Gold.—The
mine production of gold in Alaska in 1914 was $15,764,-259 against
$15,626,813 in 1913. The yield from sdiceous ores was $4,863,028 and
that from copper ores was $171,231. The placers contributed
$10,730,000, against $10,680,000 in 1913. Forty-two dredges produced
$2,350,000 of the placer gold in 1914.
From
the Pacific coast belt, including southeastern Alaska and Prince Wuliam
Sound, the production of gold was $4,538,157 in 1914, against
$4,529,529 in 1913. From the Copper Kiver and Cook Inlet region it was
$597,681—a considerable increase over the output of $378,643 in 1913.
From the Yukon and Kuskokwim basins the production decreased from
$8,183,641 in 1913 to $7,895,421 in 1914. From Seward Peninsula and
northwestern Alaska, however, the output increased slightly, from
$2,535,000 in 1913 to $2,733,000 in 1914.
Lode
nuning in the Juneau gold belt of southeastern Alaska is of increasing
interest owing to the development of the large low-grade ore bodies of
the Alaska-Juneau and Alaska-Gastineau mines, the great mills of which,
with the well-known mills of the Treadwell group on Douglas Island, are
expected to bring the production of this region to one of foremost
importance. Dredging for gold, especially on the Seward Peninsula, has
also become of first-rate magnitude and will offset to some extent
decreased placer production by more primitive methods, as at Fairbanks
and elsewhere.
About
32 per cent of the total output of gold in Alaska came from lode mines
in 1914, against 31.6 per cent in 1913, 29 per cent in 1912, and 24 per
cent in 1911, indicating a gradual transition from placer to lode
mining. Nine of the 28 gold lode mines operated in 1914 ware in
southeastern Alaska, and these produced the bulk of the $4,232,538 in
gold from this region.
The
73 J placers operated during the whole or part of 1914 yielded about
8,500,000 cubic yards of auriferous gravel, with an average recovery of
$1.26 per yard, of which the dredges handled about 4,450,000. The gold
lode mines produced 1,738,127 tons of ore, with an average gold and
silver recovery of $2.80 per ton, and six copper mines produced 153,605
tons of ore, with an average copper content of 6.98 per cent and a gold
and silver recovery value of $2.14 per ton.
Silver.—The
mine production of sdver in Alaska in 1914 was 394,805 fine ounces,
against 362,563 ounces in 1913. The copper mines produced 283,355
ounces in 1914, against 273,179 ounces in 1913; the placers produced
83,196 ounces and the gold ores 28,254 ounces.
i U. S. Geol. Survey Mineral Resources, 1914, pt. 1, p. 127, 1915.
