Churchill County Nevada Gold Production |
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FAIRVIEW DISTRICT
The Fairview district is in southeast Churchill County, 42 miles southeast of Fallon on the west slope of Fairview Peak.
The district was founded in 1906 and became a boom camp immediately. Activity leveled off after a few years, and the Nevada Hills mine emerged as the sustaining producing property until 1917, when it closed. After that time only sporadic small-scale activity was carried on in the district (Vanderburg, 1940, p. 23, 24). Production from 1906 through 1959 was about 53,100 ounces of gold, which was a byproduct from ores that were rich in silver and contained small amounts of lead and copper.
The rocks of the district consist of pre-Tertiary crystalline schists and limestones, intruded by granite (Greenan, 1914). Overlying these older rocks are dacite tuff, two andesite flows, tuff, and rhyolite, all of Tertiary age. A light-gray rhyolite plug cuts all these formations.
Veins occur in fissures in the earlier of the two andesites. The more prominent veins, the Nevada Hill, the Eagle, and the Dromedary, strike northwest and dip steeply southeast. Ore minerals are argentite, stephanite, horn silver, ruby silver, chalcopyrite, pyrite, tetrahedrite, galena, sphalerite, and gold. Gangue consists of quartz, calcite, and minor rhodochrosite and pyrolusite.
SAND SPRINGS DISTRICT
Although the Sand Springs district, which is 25 to 30 miles southeast of Fallon, was prospected in 1905, its first gold production was not until 1919. To 1937 only $30,000 (about 1,450 ounces) in gold was produced, all of it from the Dan Tucker mine (Vanderburg, 1940, p. 40). From 1937 to 1951 the district yielded 20,875 ounces of gold as a byproduct of silver ores. From 1951 through 1959 no activity was reported.
The ore bodies occur in an east-trending silicified zone that cuts country rock consisting of schist, limestone, and andesite. Free gold and minor silver chloride occur in a gangue of sugary quartz and crushed andesite (Vanderburg, 1940, p. 41).
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