14 Bulletin of the New York State Museum. 



between one and two and a half miles east of the river, opposite Cats- 

 kill, and is four miles in length, from north to south. It lies partly 

 in the town of Greenport and partly in Livingston. The ore crops 

 out in the western face and near the crest of Plass Hill at the north, 

 and in Cedar Hill and Mt. Thomas at the south. It is stratified, and 

 its beds dip at angles of 20° to 40° to the east. South of Mt. 

 Thomas and in mine No. 2, at Burden, a synclinal fold has been 

 mined out. The thickness of the ore varies considerably, and for the 

 greater part of the distance the average is from ten to twenty feet. 

 In the Burden mines as much as thirty feet of ore has been found; 

 in mine No. 2 and in Mt. Thomas upwards of forty-five feet. The 

 underlying beds are shaly and are probably of the Hudson river slate 

 formation. Above the ore there is a siliceous conglomerate, which 

 is succeeded by a shale, and that by a gray sandstone, and that, in 

 turn, by a calcareous conglomerate. 



The ore varies in composition from a siliceous and lean ore at the 

 north, which contains generally too much phosphorus for making 

 Bessemer pig-iron, to a rich, Bessemer ore at the south. Quartz in 

 fine grains, calcite in small, crystalline nests, and pyrite are common 

 in it. All of it has to be roasted before smelting. The Burden 

 mines are reached by a railway three and a half miles long, from the 

 Hudson river, near Catskill station. 



The first mining of considerable extent done on this range was in 

 1874. Next year the Hudson River Spathic Iron Ore Company was 

 organized, and the mines were worked by that company for about 

 two years. In 1882 the property came into the possession of the 

 Hudson River Ore and Iron Company, and a large establishment was 

 at once set up. There are ten roasting kilns on the river at the 

 Burden docks ; and the ore is shipped to Troy, Scranton, Pa., and 

 Franklin Furnace, New Jersey. 



