212 lEON-OEE EESEEVES. 



be siiccessfiilly mined there, a large additional tonnage may be 

 secured. 



The brown ores of the eastern United States are difficult to esti- 

 mate. They are usually low grade, mixed with clay, and often lie 

 in thin and irregular beds, but the aggregate amount is large. 



The magnetites of the Adirondacks and New Jersey are not 

 included in Tornebohm's figures. Here again the tonnage is large, 

 and if attempts at magnetic separation are successful on a large 

 scale, as they seem likely to be, we have here another important 

 source of iron ore which has not been taken into account in these 

 estimates. 



The titaniferous magnetites will be another important source of 

 supply when they can be profitably smelted. 



Unexploited iron ore deposits are widely distributed in the western 

 United States, and extravagant estimates of tonnage have been 

 reported, frequently due to the fact that the basis of comparison 

 has been the comparatively small size of the precious metal deposits 

 of the West. The writer has examined deposits of reputed large size 

 where the true tonnage seemed to him to be measured in units of 

 thousands rather than millions or tens of millions. The grade of 

 these deposits is on the average not high as compared with Lake 

 SujDerior deposits, and there is frequently a high percentage of 

 phosphorus and sulphur. Nevertheless, there is in the aggregate 

 through the western States a very large tonnage of iron ore of 

 present commercial grade. 



Among the better-know^n deposits might be mentioned those in 

 the Hartville district of Wyoming and in Fierro, N. Mex., both of 

 which are now being draw^n upon ; in Pitkin, Chaffee, Saguache, 

 Lake and Gunnison counties, Colo. ; in Iron County, Utah ; in 

 northeastern Washington, and in a number of localities in the 

 Great Basin region of Nevada and California. There should be 

 included also the ores of Vancouver and Texada islands, in British 

 Columbia, which are largely controlled by American capital and 

 w^ill be used in the United States. The same remarks may apply 

 to the Durango and other Mexican deposits. With few exceptions 

 the western ores occur along the contacts of intrusive igneous rocks 

 and limestone, and the extent to which the ores follow the contact 

 in depth has not been shown. Hence the estimates of tonnage vary 

 within very wide limits. The iron-ore deposits of Iron County, Utah, 

 are among the larger and most typical of this class of ores. Here 

 some 800 pits have been sunk, and it has been possible in recent 

 detailed mapping to estimate with a reasonable approach to the 

 truth the amount of ore of all grades appearing to the depth shown 



