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Charlie Creek (placer)

Past Producer in Alaska, United States with commodities Gold, Bismuth, Titanium
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Sections on this page
  1. Identification information
  2. Geographic coordinates
  3. Site location context
  4. Geographic areas
  5. Commodities
  6. Materials information
  7. Mineral occurrence model information
  8. Nearby scientific data
  9. Economic information about the deposit and operations
  10. Mining district
  11. Links to other databases
  12. Bibliographic references
  13. General comments
  14. Reporter information

Geologic information

Identification information

Deposit ID 10002022
MRDS ID A012868
Record type Site
Current site name Charlie Creek (placer)
Related records 10209087

Geographic coordinates

Geographic coordinates: -165.49303, 64.85735 (WGS84)
Relative position Charlie Creek is a south tributary to upper Sinuk River. Placer gold was mined in lower Charlie Creek from below the forks of upper Charlie Creek downstream to where it enters the flood plain of Sinuk River (Collier and others, 1908, plate X). This is locality 80 of Cobb (1972 [MF 463], 1978 [OFR 78-93]).

Site location context

Political divisions (FIPS codes)

Nome(Census area)

Alaska(state)

United States(country)

North America(continent)

Land(continent)

USGS map quadrangles

Nome D-1(quadrangle 1:63,360 scale)

Solomon NW(quadrangle 1:100,000 scale)

Nome(quadrangle 1:250,000 scale)

Hydrologic units (watersheds)

Nome(hydrologic unit)

Norton Sound(hydrologic accounting unit)

Northwest(hydrologic subregion)

Alaska(hydrologic region)

Geographic areas

Country State
United States Alaska

Commodities

Commodity Importance
Gold Primary
Bismuth Critical Secondary
Titanium Critical Secondary

Materials information

Materials Type of material
Arsenopyrite Ore
Bismuth Ore
Bismuthinite Ore
Gold Ore
Rutile Ore

Mineral occurrence model information

Model code 119
USGS model code 39a
Deposit model name Placer Au-PGE
Mark3 model number 54

Nearby scientific data

(1) -165.49303, 64.85735
ListMap

Economic information

Comments on the geologic information

  • Geologic Description = Placer gold was mined on Charlie (Charley) Creek on a small scale prior to WWI (Brooks and others, 1901). Moffit (1907) reports that discovery of bismuth minerals in miners' sluice boxes led to the discovery of the bismuth-bearing quartz veins (NM048) in upper Charlie Creek (Moffit, 1907). Hummel and Chapman (1960, p. B32) reported 20 ppm bismuth from a stream sediment sample from Charlie Creek, the highest content of any creek that they sampled in the southwest Seward Peninsula except for Thomson Creek (NM036) in the Kigluaik Mountains. They also reported 300 ppm arsenic, a concentration only equaled at Rock Creek in the Nome C-1 quadrangle, suggesting the presence of arsenopyrite in the creek sediments.? Charlie Creek drains pelitic biotite-garnet schist and a highly pyritic pelitic schist (Bundzten and others, 1994). These metasedimentary rocks are probably of Precambrian or early Paleozoic protolith age (Till and Dumoulin, 1994; Bundzten and others, 1994). The schist is cut by numerous quartz veinlets in cross-joints there are a few quartz veins reportedly to be as much as 4 feet wide (Chapin, 1914 [B 592-L, p. 385-395]). The quartz veins or veinlets are probably the source of the gold, native bismuth, bismuthinite and rutile that has been reported from heavy mineral concentrates from Charlie Creek.
  • Age = Quaternary.

Economic information about the deposit and operations

Development status Past Producer
Commodity type Metallic

Comments on exploration

  • Status = Probably inactive

Mining district

District name Nome

Comments on the workings information

  • Workings / Exploration = Charlie Creek was known as auriferous by 1901 (Brooks and others, 1901). The creek was mined on a small scale with sluice boxes before 1907 (Moffit, 1907). It probably has been prospected more recently.

Reference information

Bibliographic references

Comments on the references

  • Primary Reference = Moffit, 1907

General comments

Subject category Comment text
Deposit Model Name = Placer Au (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a).

Reporter information

Type Date Name Affiliation Comment
Reporter 22-OCT-99 Hawley, C.C. Hawley Resource Group
Reporter 22-OCT-99 Travis L. Hudson Hawley Resource Group

Beyond USGS

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

Maps centered on this site

Authoritative Alaska resources

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