School Tours and a Visit to the Lewiston Mining District

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Homestead at the Burr Mine site, Lewiston Mining District, Wyoming

This morning was largely a repeat of yesterday. We had another school group in, 100+ fourth graders and again telling the same story eight times. I then worked in the archives for a bit. 

At 2:00, we met up at the Carissa parking lot and met up with a group that is conducting drilling operations to collect rock cores from beneath the old Hidden Hand and Burr mines in the Lewiston Mining District, now a ghost town, about 12-15 miles from South Pass City. The tour was conducted by Rob Bergman, the CEO of Relevant Gold, a company that is modern techniques to try to locate gold deposits in this area. 

He showed us the equipment they were using, how they were attempting to locate gold, and discussed in considerable detail the geology of the area. We visited and discussed the Hidden Hand Mine, which Connie and I had visited a few weeks ago with Jan on the way back from the Radium Springs trip. While we were at the Hidden Hand, Rob, pointed out the Burr Mine in the distance, It looked vaguely familiar.

 

  
 
The entrance to the Burr Mine, now locked up. To the right of the entrance, there is a large quartz vein (white). This is the vein that was being mined.
 

We drove down to the Burr mine and I recognized the old homestead from a trip here two years ago. More discussion of geology and mining and then we headed back to South Pass City and dinner.

We saw about eight pronghorn antelope on the way out to the mine and about 15 on the way back in.

 

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