366 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES. 



have been tested and recognized continuous, we find them opened on 

 the Ralston Creek, at Murphy's, five miles north of Golden, where the 

 vein, nearly vertical, averages in thickness 16 feet of solid coal without 

 parting of any kind. Eighteen thousand tons of lignite have been 

 taken from this mine since it was opened. 



Half a mile south of Murphy's, the Mineral Land Company has opened 

 the same vein, 9 feet thick, also without parting, but contorted in its 

 uplift. The lignite is of the same quality, but the bed has not yet beeii 

 worked to any extent. 



North of Ealston Creek to Marshall, the lignite is not worked now. 

 Bat, as it has been already remarked, in the banks of all the creeks 

 which, descending from the mountains, have dug their beds throngh 

 the Eocene formation, beds of lignite varying in thickness from 5 to 

 9 feet are exposed ; some of them already tested have been worked 

 formerly to some extent. The conclusion, therefore, on the continuity 

 of the Lignitic basin from south of Golden, even from the North Platte 

 to Boulder Creek, is fully warranted. It is, in a direct line, a distance 

 of fifty miles, and even, as beds of lignite have been reported from 

 Thomson Creek and Cachala Poudre Eiver, the contiauity of the Lignitic 

 beds maybe admitted for fifteen to twenty miles fnrther north. The ex- 

 tent of the basin from east to west, or its width, is not as yet ascer- 

 tained. In the space limited between the primitive rocks and the 

 basaltic dike, where the strata are thrown up nearly perpendicular, the 

 amount of coal can be computed only from the depth attainable in the 

 working of the mines. The length of this area from the Eowe mine to 

 Coal Creek is about fifteen miles. Thence northward, as the strata 

 take their normal horizontal position, the lignite-beds appear to be 

 continuous from the base of the mountains to the Platte, or for about 

 fiiteen miles from west to east. I have no doubt that beds of lignite 

 can be founds further east by shaft, as they have been found east of 

 Denver, on the Kansas Pacific Eailroad. But as the quality of the 

 lignite deteriorates in proportion to the distance from the mountains, 

 the combustible mineral would be there of little value, especially while 

 an immense amount of lignite of good quality is as yet untouched in 

 the valley of Boulder Creek. The section at Marshall's indicates 63 feet 

 of coal in a thickness of 500 to 600 feet, seven of the beds varying in 

 thickness from 4 to 14 feet, the lowest one now worked, 10 feet. Even 

 from Marshall's estate little coal has been taken out till now, on 

 account of the difiiculty of transportation. From information kindly 

 given by the jjroprietor, the mining amounts to about twenty-five tons 

 Ijer day, while, with the facilities of railroad transportation, the same 

 mine could be worked in a way to furnish at least three hundred tons 

 per day. Most of the coal of this country is obtained from the Erie 

 mine, fourteen miles southeast of Marshall's, where the bank is 8 to 10 

 feet thick. The land is the property of the Kansas Pacific Eailroad, 

 which has a branch railroad to Boulder City, and, of course, preserves 

 the monopoly of transportation. They take out of the mine an average 

 of two hundred tons daily. A railroad is now in progress of construc- 

 tion from Julesburgh to Golden, traced through the rich Lignitic depos- 

 its of the Boulder Valley, and passing three miles east and north of 

 Marshall's. This railroad, of course, will change much the proportion of 

 coal mining from different localities where lignitic coal is obtained, 

 bringing to market the material in quantity relative to its quality. 



The facility of transportation may not be at first an advantage to the 

 proprietors on account of the greater competition in the market, the 

 demand as yet not being considerable enough to justify explorations of 



