52  CONTRIBUTIONS    TO    ECONOMIC    GEOLOGY,   1903.  [bull. 225. 
lower  grade.  Statements  in  print  are  not  infrequent  from  which  it 
would  be  inferred  that  only  bonanzas  can  profitably  be  exploited  in 
the  Nome  region.  Pay  streaks  which  have  yielded  $30  to  $10  and 
even  $100  per  cubic  yard  are  not  uncommon,  but  these  do  not  form 
any  considerable  percentage  of  the  auriferous  gravels  which  carry 
values.  Much  profitable  mining-  is  done  in  gravels  which  will  not 
average  over  $3  and  $4,  and  if  the  facts  were  known  it  would  be 
found  that  probably  much  ground  of  lower  grade  is  even  now  being 
worked.  The  cost  of  mining  is  being  rapidly  reduced,  and  it  is  fair 
to  presume  that  eventually  values  of  $1  and  possibly  50  cents  per  cubic 
yard  can  be  mined  with  profit. 
Some  plants  have  been  installed  for  dredging  with  bucket  dredge  or 
with  steam  shovel,  but  these  enterprises  have  not  yet  jdelded  an}^  con- 
siderable amount  of  gold.  Probably  the  most  successful  of  these  plants 
so  far  are  those  which  have  been  operated  on  rich  portions  of  the  beach, 
where  the  material  handled  was  entirely  loose  and  no  difficulty  was 
experienced  in  disposing  of  the  tailings.  Beach  mining  is  still  carried 
on,  but  is  almost  a  thing  of  the  past.  The  gravel  plain,  or  tundra 
placers,  which  lie  within  a  few  miles  of  Nome,  have  not  received  the 
attention  which  their  importance  is  believed  to  warrant.  Extensive 
prospecting  with  churn  drills  has  demonstrated  the  presence  of  gold  in 
these  deposits,  a  conclusion  which  had  previously  been  arrived  at  from 
purely  geologic  lines  of  reasoning,  based  on  the  investigations  of  the 
United  States  Geological  Survey."  In  the  reports  of  1899  and  1900  it 
was  pointed  out  that  old  beach  deposits  would  probably  be  found  in 
tins  tundra  belt,  and  this  theory  has  since  been  substantiated  by  the 
discovery  of  an  old  beach  deposit  which  has  been  mined  at  a  profit. 
It  was  also  shown  that  auriferous  gravels  would  most  likely  be  found 
at  other  points  in  the  tundra,  which  while  of  lower  grade  might  profit- 
ably be  exploited.  These  latter  deposits  have  been  mined  along  the 
courses  of  some  of  the  streams  with  the  aid  of  steam  shovels  and 
dredges,  but  in  general  it  can  be  said  that  entirely  successful  methods 
of  exploitation  have  not  yet  been  elaborated. 
Underground  or  drifting  operations  form  another  phase  of  mining 
at  Nome,  which  has  yielded  large  returns.  This  has  been  carried  on 
to  a  limited  extent  in  the  tundra  belt,  but  only  during  the  winter,  when 
operations  were  not  hampered  by  the  surface  drainage.  The  more 
important  drifting  has  been  on  the  high-bench  gravels  in  the  divide 
between  Anvil,  Dexter,  and  Dry  creeks.  Attention  was  called  to  these 
high  gravels  in  the  Preliminary  Report  of  1899, b  but  they  were  not 
exploited  until  1900,  and  have  since  then  yielded  large  returns.     The 
"Compare  Schrader,  F.  C,  and  Brooks,  A.  H.,  Preliminary  Report  on  the  Cape  Nome  Gold  Region: 
Special  Reports  on  Alaska,  U.  S.  Geol.  Survey,  1900;  and  Brooks,  A.  H.,  Richardson,  G.  B.,  Collier, 
A.  J.,  and  Mendenhall,  W.  C,  A  Reconnaissanceof  the  Nome  and  Adjacent  Gold  Fields  in  the  Seward 
Peninsula  in  1900:  Special  Reports  on  Alaska,  U.  S.  Geol.  Survey,  1901. 
l>  Schrader,  F.  C,  and  Brooks,  A.  H.,  op.  cit. 
