THE ADIRONDACK GRAPHITE DEPOSITS 5/ 



The Lakeside Mine of the American Graphite Company 



Location. This mine is located near the shore of Lake George, 

 just back of the Trout House at Hague, township of Hague, Warren 

 county. 



The American Graphite Company opened this mine many years 

 ago. The property represents one of the first occurrences of 

 graphite quartz schist in New York State and possibly in the 

 country to have been exploited. 



The workings consist of two parallel drifts driven for a con- 

 siderable distance due magnetic north, nearly parallel to the strike, 

 which is N 20° W. How far these extend is not known, as it was 

 impossible at the time of the visit to explore them for more than 

 several hundred feet on account of water. The two are about 50 to 

 60 feet apart and the easterly one is 15 feet higher than the other. 

 They are nearly horizontal but gradually slope downward so that 

 free drainage becomes impossible. How extensive the underground 

 operations are is not known. The upper drift is entered also by a 

 slope about 100 feet from the portal. 



Geology. The stratigraphy is strikingly like that of the Dixon 

 and Faxon properties, but with minor variations. The graphite bed 

 is a single stratum of the Dixon schist 12 to 15 feet thick. The 

 footwall is the Hague gneiss in its typical development, 1 which in 

 turn lies upon the Trumbull gneiss, which rests upon and holds 

 inclusions of a para-amphibolite. This hornblendic rock is better 

 shown at the Hooper mine, where it is named the Dresden. 



The hanging wall is different from that found at the Dixon and 

 Faxon properties, as the Faxon limestone is absent. Specimens 

 taken just above the two portals appear to be the Dixon schist minus 

 graphite. Quartz is the dominant mineral with accessory feldspar, 

 which is entirely altered to sericite and traces of pyrite, chlorite, 

 apatite and titanite. A little higher up, however, this quartz schist 

 becomes very feldspathic until a true feldspar-schist (" arkosite ") 

 is found. The feldspar is chiefly soda-microcline. An abnormal 

 percentage of titanite (CaTiSiO ;5 ) suggests that some igneous in- 

 fluence has been at work. Again it is possible that this feldspar 

 schist is equivalent to the Faxon limestone or that the limestone 

 possibly is not represented. In stratigraphic geology a change in 

 character of equivalent beds is usually thought to be the result of 

 different conditions obtaining at the time of deposition ; for example, 



1 Kemp, J. P., U. S. G, S : Bui. 225, p. 513. 



