Gold Eagle Mine

Occurrence in Chaffee county in Colorado, United States with commodities Copper, Silver, Zinc, Lead, Gold, Molybdenum

Sections on this page

Identification information
Geographic coordinates
Site location context
Geographic areas
Commodities
Materials information
Nearby scientific data
Economic information about the deposit and operations
Bibliographic references
General comments
Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID	10311053
Record type	Site
Current site name	Gold Eagle Mine
Alternate or previous names	Blank Mine

Comments on the site identification

Same location as "Blank Mine" labeled on MF-658.

Geographic coordinates

Point of reference	Geographic coordinates:	Precision	Relative position
Main Entrance	-106.2125, 38.59833 (WGS84)	10	shaft on topo.
(click for info)
Pit	-106.21293, 38.59857 (WGS84)	10	Top dump. (ABWilson, GPS location 9/11/2010) Trail makes a switchback to the SW of the shaft to get up the hill to this clearing.
Main Entrance	-106.21023, 38.59781 (WGS84)	10	Near center of the largest open cut. Bare ground. Large dump appears to have been bulldozed across the road. This dump is the end of the drivable road. Trail goes up the hill to the rest of the workings. Location by ABWilson by GPS, 9/11/2010.
Main Entrance	-106.2103, 38.60017 (WGS84)	10	Overgrown but very old caved adit and dump in the woods. N-most of the workings associated with this mine. Location by GPS, 9/11/2010, ABWilson.

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Chaffee(county)

Colorado(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Maysville(quadrangle 1:24,000 scale)

Gunnison(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Montrose(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Arkansas Headwaters(hydrologic unit)

Upper Arkansas(hydrologic accounting unit)

Upper Arkansas(hydrologic subregion)

Arkansas-White-Red(hydrologic region)

Federal lands

Pike and San Isabel National Forests(National Forest)

National Forest FS(Type of land area)

FS(Federal land areas administered by FS)

Geographic areas

Country	State	County
United States	Colorado	Chaffee

Comments on the location information

Shaft is about 9 miles NW of Poncha Springs, on the SE slope of Mount Shavano, in the SE/4 sec 8, T 50 N, R 7 E. (Section, Township, Range, not shown on Maysville topo (1983).
Location description given as SE4 of Sec. 8 matches location of workings shown on 24k topo. And, same location as "Blank Mine" labeled on MF-658.

Commodities

Commodity	Importance
Copper	Primary
Silver	Primary
Zinc Critical	Primary
Lead	Primary
Gold	Secondary
Molybdenum	Tertiary

Comments on the commodity information

Rounded boulders contained 42 oz/ton silver, 19.9% copper, 25% zinc, 15.5% lead, and 0.02 oz/ton gold, according to one assay. (Sunshine files, 1964)

Materials information

Materials	Type of material
Chalcopyrite	Ore
Galena	Ore
Molybdenite	Ore
Sphalerite	Ore
Calcite	Gangue
Pyrite	Gangue

Nearby scientific data

Main Entrance (1)	Glacial drift	ListMap
Pit (2)	Glacial drift	ListMap
Main Entrance (3)	Glacial drift	ListMap
Main Entrance (4)	Glacial drift	ListMap

Economic information

Comments on the geologic information

A 1964 report describes discovery of copper-lead-zinc sulfide and limestone boulders in a drag(?) fault zone in the Gold Eagle shaft, and describes efforts to locate their source by additional exploration. (Sunshine files)

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Operation type	Underground
Development status	Occurrence
Commodity type	Metallic
Significant	No

Comments on development

Site appears to have consisted of a very old adit (the N-most of the workings on the topo), a shaft (shaft on topo), and 2 open cuts (the 2 X's in white areas on the topo). A tiny cabin is immediately north of the open cut where the road turns to trail (west of the road). The site appears to have been abandoned for many decades.

Reference information

Bibliographic references

Location

USGS, 1994, Maysville 1:24,000 scale, 7 1/2-minute topographic map.
Deposit

Sunshine Mining Co. Colorado exploration files, unpublished data, Colorado Geological Survey.
Geology

Scott and others, 1975, Geologic map of the Poncha Springs [15-minute] quadrangle, Chaffee County, Colorado: USGS Misc. Field Studies Map MF-658, scale 1:62,500.

General comments

Subject category	Comment text
General	Site visited by A.B. Wilson (9/11/2010) while hiking the Colorado Trail near Mt. Shavano. A good road goes to the lower mine area. A small dilapidated cabin is to the N of the barren spot (white area on 1994 topo) before the road turns into a trail and makes a switchback up to the upper workings. The barren spot that looks like a large trench and reclaimed dumps or waste piles bulldozed across the road. A steady stream of water issues from near the center of the largest part of the cut and flows down the road. Water appears clear. No ore is obvious. Only metal found was a nickel (the coin). Approx. 0.16 mi (as the crow flies) to the WNW, is a small hole on the NW side of the trail with a relict dump on the SE side. Assume that this hole or pit, with a few timbers protruding, is the reamins of the shaft on the topo. Continuing past this the trail makes a switchback up to an area similar to the lower cut. There may once have been an adit into the hillside here, but all that is left is a scar. Again, no ore visible. Did not go uphill to the top two Xs marked on the topo.

Subject category

Comment text

General

Site visited by A.B. Wilson (9/11/2010) while hiking the Colorado Trail near Mt. Shavano. A good road goes to the lower mine area. A small dilapidated cabin is to the N of the barren spot (white area on 1994 topo) before the road turns into a trail and makes a switchback up to the upper workings. The barren spot that looks like a large trench and reclaimed dumps or waste piles bulldozed across the road. A steady stream of water issues from near the center of the largest part of the cut and flows down the road. Water appears clear. No ore is obvious. Only metal found was a nickel (the coin). Approx. 0.16 mi (as the crow flies) to the WNW, is a small hole on the NW side of the trail with a relict dump on the SE side. Assume that this hole or pit, with a few timbers protruding, is the reamins of the shaft on the topo. Continuing past this the trail makes a switchback up to an area similar to the lower cut. There may once have been an adit into the hillside here, but all that is left is a scar. Again, no ore visible. Did not go uphill to the top two Xs marked on the topo.

Reporter information

Type	Date	Name	Affiliation	Comment
Reporter	2006-03-07	Beach, Richard A.	Colorado Geological Survey
Editor	2010-09-08	Wilson, Anna B.	U.S. Geological Survey

Beyond USGS

Supplemental information added by qvyshift.com. Not part of the original USGS MRDS record.

Maps centered on this site

Authoritative Colorado resources

These are landing pages for further research — the state agencies don't currently expose per-mine deep links.