Lucky Boy Mine [2] (Samoa Mine), Chloride, Chloride Mining District, Wallapai Mining District, Cerbat Mountains (Cerbat Range), Mohave County, Arizona, USAi

Regional Level Types
Lucky Boy Mine [2] (Samoa Mine)	Mine
Chloride	Town
Chloride Mining District	Mining District
Wallapai Mining District	Mining District
Cerbat Mountains (Cerbat Range)	Mountain Range
Mohave County	County
Arizona	State
USA	Country

SAMOA MINE.

Location. The Samoa mine is 3½ miles east by about half a mile south of Chloride, just north of Cherum Peak and about one-third of a mile south of the Lucky Boy mine. It lies at an elevation of about 5,900 feet, in the steep crestal slope of the Cerbat Range, at the head of a gulch which drains westward into Samoa Wash.

History and production. The Samoa is one of the early locations and for many years has been the most active and constant producer of good-grade gold and silver ore in the district. The property comprises a group of four claims and a fraction, the Samoa, Samoa No. 1, Samoa No. 2, Fourth of March, and Mountain Dew. The property is owned by the Chloride Gold Mining Company, with headquarters at Pueblo, Colo.

The total production of the Samoa mine has been about $180,000. Approximately $70,000 was produced in early times, the remainder being obtained by the present management under Leonard Hoffman, which took effect in November, 1903. The mine has a record of being a steady producer. The present output is about 90 tons a month. The ore is shipped principally to the Needles smelter. Advices received early in 1908 report that the mine was then being worked on a small scale only by lessees.

Geology. The vein is contained in the pre-Cambrian granitoid series; the predominating gray or dark-gray granitic rock is much the same as that at the Lucky Boy mine. A distinct sheeting trends about north and south and dips at about 80° E. The series is intruded by a large dike of fine-grained, schistose microcline granite, which a short distance below the mine along the trail is in turn cut by a 100-foot rhyolite dike trending northward toward the Lucky Boy mine.

Veins and ore. There are six parallel veins which strike about N. 10° W. and stand nearly vertical or dip steeply to the east at angles of about 80°. Named in consecutive order, beginning on the east, they are vein No. 1 or Samoa No. 1; vein No. 1½; vein No. 2 or Samoa No. 2; vein No. 3; Fourth of March or Samoa vein (on which are located the Fourth of March and Samoa claims); vein No. 3½ or " Blind " vein; vein No. 4 or Mountain Dew. Vein No. 3½ does not, like all the other veins, outcrop at the surface, but was encountered in driving the crosscut tunnel. Nos. 1 and 2 are situated 551 feet apart and Nos. 2 and 3 are 138 feet apart.

The principal producing vein, the one on which nearly all the work has been done, is No. 3, the Fourth of March. Its average thickness is about 4 feet, and the ore shoot is up to 30 inches wide. The ore holds to the foot wall and is overlain by several inches to 1 foot of gouge or altered granite. The ore contains pyrite, galena, and zinc blende in quartz gangue; occasionally a little molybdenum is found in cross veinlets of spar. There is no copper. The principal value, however, is in the gold and silver contained in the sulphides. The ore now shipped, as shown by the smelter return sheets for 1903 to 1906, inclusive, runs about as follows: Gold, 1½ ounces per ton; silver, 15 ounces per ton; lead, 8 per cent; and zinc, 5 to 8 per cent.

The levels on this vein have been considerably extended since the field work for this paper was done. The most noteworthy feature of the ore is its constancy in good gold values. Some specimens show portions of the ore, especially the zinc blende, heavily coated with secondary enrichment or growth of the black silver sulphide, which, at 600 feet below the surface, seems to speak well for the mine. Some specimens also show considerable native silver. The first ore in shipping quantities was taken from tunnel level No. 1. The ore shoot at this point was about 65 feet long, and in tunnel level No. 2 the same shoot is reported to have had an extent of 400 feet.

The other veins and their ore are in most respects similar to No. 3. As yet but little more than development work has been done on them. Veins Nos. 1, 2, 3½, and 4 are leased to the Arizona Birmingham [Alabama] Gold Mining Company, which is now drifting on vein No. 1. This vein, thought by some to be probably one of the Lucky Boy veins, has produced some ore. When visited by the writer early in February, 1907, a new " strike " had just been made on this vein on the 200-foot level, where the breast of the drift 80 feet south of the crosscut tunnel showed 20 inches of clean, good-looking ore.

Developments. The principal developments consist of three tunnels, 350, 900, and 1,200 feet in length, a main working shaft 335 feet deep on vein No. 3, and various drifts and stopes mostly along this vein north and south of the main shaft. There are over 3,000 feet of underground workings on vein No. 3 alone. It has three levels spaced 100 feet apart vertically. Tunnel No. 1 is 140 feet above tunnel No. 2, which is 50 feet above the first, or 100-foot level, and runs southeast. Tunnel No. 3 is a 1,200-foot crosscut tunnel in the plane of the second level; it runs N. 75° E., strikes the main producing vein 350 feet in from the entrance, at a point a few feet north of the shaft, and extends a few feet beyond vein No. 1. On the first level the vein is drifted on for 300 feet to the north and 650 feet to the south; on the second level, 300 feet north and 434 feet south.

A large amount of ore has been stoped and shipped from vein No. 3 from the ground immediately above tunnel No. 2, and from the vicinity of the shaft just above the first level. Present shipments are from the second and third levels. On the third level but little stoping has been done, and most of the ground between the second and third levels still remains intact. The ore on the whole is opened for a length of more than 800 feet along the vein.

Two plants well equipped with gasoline engines/are located at the collar of the main shaft and the entrance of the crosscut tunnel. A wagon road connects the mine with the railroad at Chloride, but as yet the ore is packed to the railroad more directly on burros. Thirty men were employed in 1907.

The Samoa mine is undoubtedly a promising property, but although it seems in all respects to have been honestly, and for the most part, ably managed, and although the workings have been in ore all the time, so far as could be learned, it has not paid much more than expenses. It is well to note that the mine as a whole is rather a low-grade than a high-grade property, and that therefore the ore should be handled with a view to the greatest economy. The support and operation of a large pack train entails in itself a very heavy expense. Furthermore, the mine has never had an underground survey. Up to the present time the work has been carried on without plats, plans, or records of any kind, a very unusual procedure for so large a mine and one with such a system of veins. Recent reports state that the Samoa and Lucky Boy mines are to be worked jointly on a large scale through a main tunnel opening on Lucky Boy ground.