Squaw Creek; Big Squaw Creek Mine, Chandalar Mining District, Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area, Alaska, USAi

Regional Level Types
Squaw Creek; Big Squaw Creek Mine	Mine
Chandalar Mining District	Mining District
Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area	Census Area
Alaska	State
USA	Country

Location: Big Squaw Creek (Squaw Creek on the modern topographic map) drains the area of the Chandalar gold lodes and terminates at Squaw Lake. The coordinates are on the upper creek at the most likely location of the probably limited mining on the creek. The mine is about 0.7 mile southwest of Little Squaw Peak in section 4, T. 32 N., R. 3 W., of the Fairbanks Meridian. The location is accurate.
Geology: Squaw Creek cuts through the Chandalar lode gold district, and the placer gold occurrences in this area are generally attributed to direct weathering of the gold-bearing veins. In spite of the proximity of Squaw Creek to the gold-bearing veins, most of the placer mining activity on this creek appears to have been limited to an area near the head of the creek (Chipp, 1970). This area on the upper creek, just below the Jupiter claim on the Eneveloe prospect (CH046), was mined, although there was little gravel in the creek bed and in places the creek was running on bedrock. On the lower creek early efforts at mining the deeper gravels were thwarted as the gravels were thawed and the shafts were flooded. The gold that has been produced was in thin gravels along an irregular bedrock surface. The gravels are coarse and subangular with numerous greenstone boulders and slabs of schist. Glacial damming and disruption of drainage has created both pre- and post-glacial generations of placers. The placer concentrates contain gold, pyrite, arsenopyrite, stibnite, monazite, uranothorianite, galena, molybdenite, and zircon. A sediment sample from the middle fork of Big Squaw Creek showing 0.001 percent eU contained trace monazite, uranothorianite, pyrite, galena, and rare molybdenite, and zircon (Nelson and others, 1954, p. 16, 18, table 10, sample 4638). In 2004, Little Squaw Gold Mining Company controlled 8,550 acres of patented and unpatented mining claims in the Chandalar district which includes all or part of Squaw Creek. This company contracted a district-scale analysis of the placer and lode gold potential of the district by Pacific Rim Geological Consulting, Inc. This study was completed in April, 2004 (Barker and Bundtzen, 2004).
Workings: The only mining on Little Squaw Creek was from small-scale surface workings by hand methods. Mining in 1923 was in gravel 3 to 4 feet deep. Mining was reported as late as 1928, but there is no information on any later activity. In 2004, Little Squaw Gold Mining Company controlled 8,550 acres of patented and unpatented mining claims in the Chandalar district which includes all or part of Squaw Creek. This company contracted a district-scale analysis of the placer and lode gold potential of the district by Pacific Rim Geological Consulting, Inc. This study was completed in April, 2004 (Barker and Bundtzen, 2004).
Age: Quaternary.
Production: Probably some small production that cannot be documented.

Commodities (Major) - Au; (Minor) - Ag, Mo, Pb, Sb, Th, U
Development Status: Yes; small
Deposit Model: Placer Au (Cox and Singer, 1986; model 39a)

Other Databases

Link to USGS - Alaska:	CH047

Other Regions, Features and Areas containing this locality

References