Copper Chief Mine (Copper Chief orebody; Iron King Mine; Equator Mine; Iron King-Equator Mine; Copper Chief-Iron King-Equator Mine; Hayden Development Co. property), Jerome, Verde District, Black Hills (Black Hill Range), Yavapai Co., Arizona, USA

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‡Ref.: Lindgren, W. (1926), Ore deposits of the Jerome and Bradshaw Mountains quadrangles, Arizona, USGS Bull. 782: 27, 91-92.

Trischka, C. (1938), Some Arizona ore deposits, Arizona Bureau of Mines Bull. 145: 55-56.

Galbraith, F.W. (1947), Minerals of Arizona, Arizona Bureau of Mines Bull. 153: 19, 20.

Anderson, C.A. & S.C. Creasey (1958), Geology and ore deposits of the Jerome area, Yavapai County, Arizona, USGS PP 308: 94, 149-151.

Galbraith, F.W. & D.J. Brennan (1959), Minerals of Arizona: 50.

Rogers, Thornwell (1979) Copper Chief Mine, M.S. thesis, Northern Arizona University (unpublished).

Niemuth, N.J. & K.A. Phillips (1992), Copper Oxide Resources, Arizona Department of Mines & Mineral Resources Open File Rept. 92-10: 17 (Table 1).

Anthony, J.W., et al (1995), Mineralogy of Arizona, 3rd.ed.: 159, 167, 328.

U.S. Bureau of Mines - Arizona Bureau of Geology and Mineral Technology file data.

USGS Cottonwood Quadrangle map.

Arizona Department of Mineral Resources Equator Group file.

Arizona Department of Mineral Resources Shea Copper Co. property file.

MRDS database Dep. ID #10048232, MRDS ID #M800331; and, Dep. ID #10113797, MAS ID #0040251177; and, Dep. ID #10137846, MAS ID #0040250558.

A former underground Cu-Au-Ag-Pb-Zn mine located on 21 claims in the N½ sec. 12, T.15N., R.2.5E. (Cottonwood 7.5 minute topo map), 3½ miles SSE of Jerome. The Copper Chief Mining Co. owned the western part and the Equator Mining and Smelting Co. owned the eastern part. Phelps Dodge subsequently owned the entire property. Produced 1901-1948. Claims extend into the SW¼SE¼SW¼ of sec. 1. NOTE: This is not the Iron King Mine near Humboldt, Big Bug District.

Mineralization is a massive sulfide orebody that has replaced highly foliated and sheared Shea basalt and tuffaceous sedimentary interbeds. The Shea basalt has been intruded by quartz porphyry (Deception Rhyolite, Cleopatra Quartz Porphyry Member), which at the surface forms the north margin of the ore zone where the contact is essentially vertical and some fault movement is indicated. Granodiorite porphyry dikes trending north-northeastward cut the Shea basalt, quartz porphyry, and the ore zone.

The deposit lies in an East-West shear zone between porphyry and greenstone known as the Copper Chief fault. It dips west and NW at a very low angle. It is largely a sheeted zone containing some introduced quartz parallel to the sheeting. The northeastward trending granodiorite porphyry dikes are displaced to the east in the hanging wall block about 300 feet.

The primary ore is massive pyritic sulfide shaped as an elongate lens trending N.80ºE. in the highly foliated and sheared Shea basalt, but secondary (oxide) ore extended beyond the limits of the massive sulfide. The surface trace of the ore zone is about 800 feet long. The massive sulfide lens is much shorter and plunges to the east. The massive sulfide replaced the foliated Shea basalt essentially parallel to the foliation so that the southern irregular contact (footwall) dips north.

The western part of the orebody contained a gossan about 60 feet wide and 250 feet long, but the top of the massive sulfide, at a depth of 240 feet, was smaller. On the 320 level the massive sulfide bottomed on foliated Shea basalt.

Workings include a 350 foot deep shaft plus 2,225 feet of drifts on various levels. Production in 1904-05 30,000 tons of sulfide ore yielding 1,300,000 pounds of Cu.

Mineral List

Cerussite Chalcocite

Chalcopyrite 'Chlorite Group'

Muscovite var: Sericite Pyrite

Sphalerite

7 entries listed. 5 valid minerals.