HUMBOLDT MINE
Eagle River, Keweenaw Co., MI
August
4, 2003
The
dirt road leading to the Humboldt Mine
The
Humboldt dump.
This
was the first of the Keweenaw Week field trips that I attended.
The
Humboldt Mine is one of the more obscure of the copper mines in the region. It
isn’t even listed in MAS/MILS. From what I was told, it was only operated for
about a year, some time in the 19th century. As a result, the dump
is quite small.
The
dump is located at lat. 47 deg. 24.993’ lon. –88 deg. 14.374’. It is reached
from US 41 by going north on Eagle Harbor Rd. for 0.8 miles, turning left on to
Garden City Rd., and going 0.5 miles to a dirt road on the right. The dump is
about 0.1 mile in, and to the left of the road.
There
wasn’t very much copper to be found, and what there was was encapsulated in
Quartz rather than Calcite. Perhaps that’s why the mine was only operated for a
year: not much Copper! I did put a few Copper in Qurtz specimens on the price
list. The Copper is distorted a bit when viewed through the Quartz. It does
keep the Copper bright, though! I did get some nice Pumpellyite, both matted
fibers and spherulitic groups.
The
pictures from this locality are courtesy of Dan Behnke. I still didn’t have a
working camera at this time.
ON TO THE NEXT TRIP: Delaware
Mine