Geology: The Science of the Earth's Crust — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Geology: The Science of the Earth's Crust
John Stuart Mill · en
Third in rank among the copper-producing States is Michigan, the mines
being located on Keweenaw Peninsula, which extends into Lake Superior.
For fully fifty years this district has been one of the most famous and
important copper producers in the world. A unique feature is that the
ore is native copper, associated with some native silver. The rocks
containing the ore are steeply tilted lava sheets and conglomerate
(cemented gravel) strata of Proterozoic Age. Openings in porous
lava and spaces between the conglomerate pebbles have been filled
by metallic copper, which was carried off in hot solutions from the
cooling lavas. Certain of the mining shafts have been sunk more than
5,000 feet below the surface, these being next to the deepest in the
world.
Utah ranks fourth among the copper producers, the greatest mining
district being at Bingham Canyon, southwest of Salt Lake City. The
rocks are late Paleozoic strata, pierced by a large body of igneous
rock. Some of the sulphide ores (mainly chalcopyrite) occur in veins
in the igneous rock and some in large tabular masses in the adjacent
limestone. Hot solutions from lower portions of the uncooled igneous
rock carried the ore in solution into the limestone and into cracks in
the upper cooled igneous rock.
Lead. Lead must surely be counted among the five or six most useful
metals. As in the case of nearly all the other most important natural
resources, the United States is the world's greatest producer of
lead, the output of metallic lead having been 552,000 tons in 1916
and somewhat less in 1918. Most of this came from Missouri, Idaho,
Utah, and Colorado. The leading other countries are in order--Spain,
Germany, Mexico, and Australia. Nearly all the lead comes from the
mineral galena (a sulphide of lead), which is described in the chapter
on "Mineralogy." Among the many uses of lead are the following:
manufacture of certain high-grade paints from lead compounds; making
alloys such as pewter, type metal, solder, babbit metal; in plumbing;
in glass making; and in the manufacture of shot.
The greatest lead-mining district is in the vicinity of Joplin, Mo.,
where the ore (galena), associated with much zinc ore, occurs as veins
and great irregular deposits in limestone of early Paleozoic Age. It
is generally agreed that underground waters dissolved the ores out of
the limestone in which they were disseminated as tiny particles and
deposited them in concentrated form at lower levels.
In the famous Coeur d'Alene district of northern Idaho the great output
of lead is really obtained from a lead-silver ore; that is, galena
rich in silver. This ore is in composition a lead-silver sulphide. It
occurs in great fissure veins, mostly following fault fractures in
highly folded strata of Proterozoic Age. Igneous rocks cut through the
strata, and it is believed that hot ore-bearing solutions given off
from the highly heated igneous rocks rose in the fissures and deposited
the ores.