Nelson Creek Occurrence, Fairhaven District, Northwest Arctic Borough, Alaska, USA

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Location: Nelson Creek is a small north tributary to Old Glory Creek; the mouth of Nelson Creek is 6,500 feet upstream of the confluence of Old Glory Creek and American Creek. Old Glory Creek is a southwest tributary to Pinnell River. This is part of locality 72 of Cobb (1972; MF 417; 1975; OFR 75-429).
Geology: An abandoned placer cut on a north bench just above the mouth of Nelson Creek exposes schist bedrock containing quartz segregations and boudins. A sample of boudined quartz and some enclosing schist assayed 0.02 ounces/ton Au, 0.10 ounces/ton Ag, 0.05 % Cu, 0.05 % Pb, and 0.05 % Zn (Herried, 1966, Table 1). Herried (1966) also reported this analytical result as $0.70 per ton gold (not 0.70 ounces/ton Au as restated by Cobb, 1975, and Hudson and others, 1977). The bedrock here is locally bleached and cut by a clay altered zone. Bedrock of the area is a metasedimentary schist and marble sequence of Lower Paleozoic age (Till and others, 1986).
Workings: An abandoned placer cut on a north bench just above the mouth of Nelson Creek exposes schist bedrock containing quartz segregations and boudins.
Age: Epigenetic mineralization in metamorphic rocks of Seward Peninsula is primarily of Cretaceous age. Some lode gold deposits on southern Seward Peninsula are mid-Cretaceous in age (see Midnight Mountain, BN047).
Alteration: Schist is bleached locally and crosscut by a zone of clay alteration.

Commodities (Major) - Au; (Minor) - Ag
Development Status: No
Deposit Model: Quartz veins and segregations in metasedimentary rocks.

References

Cobb, E.H., 1972, Metallic mineral resources map of the Bendeleben quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Miscellaneous Field Studies Map MF-417, 1 sheet, scale 1:250,000. Cobb, E.H., 1975, Summary of references to mineral occurrences (other than mineral fuels and construction materials) in the Bendeleben quadrangle, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 75-429, 123 p. Herried, G.H., 1966, The geology and geochemistry of the Inmachuk River map area, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: Alaska Division of Mines and Minerals Geological Report 23, 25 p., 1 sheet, scale 1:63,360. Hudson, T.L., Miller, M. L., and Pickthorn, W. J., 1977, Map showing metalliferous and selected nonmetalliferous mineral deposits, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 77-796-B, 46 p., 1 sheet, scale 1:1,000,000. Till, A.B., Dumoulin, J.A., Gamble, B. ., Kaufman, D.S., and Carroll, P.I., 1986, Preliminary geologic map and fossil data, Soloman, Bendeleben, and southern Kotzebue quadrangles, Seward Peninsula, Alaska: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 86-276, 10 p., 3 plates, scale 1:250,000.

Mineral List

'Clay' ?

Pyrite

Quartz

3 entries listed. 2 valid minerals.