McCoy, Meadow Valley Mountains, Mellan Mountain Districts

Publication Info:
Nevada Mining Districts (Compiled Reports)
The Districts Described in This Section are from the following publications:

Mining Districts of Nevada - Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology Report 47 (updated 1998); Placer Gold Deposits of Nevada - USGS Bulletin 1356 (1973)

Table of Contents

McCoy District

Overview

Other Names: Horse Canyon

County: Lander

Discovered: 1914

Commodities: silver, gold, iron, lead, zinc

Comments

The original McCoy district covered only the eastern flank of the northern part of the Fish Creek Range about 30 miles south-southwest of Battle Mountain. The district is now enlarged to include all of the northern tip of the Fish Creek Range.

References

Stoddard, 1932, p. 50; Schrader, 1934, p. 1; Vanderburg, 1939, p. 64; Bonham, 1976; Stewart and others, 1977, p. 86

McCoy Placer District Description

Location

East flank of the Fish Creek Mountains, on the west side of the Reese River Valley, T. 28 N., R. 42 E. (unsurveyed).

Topographic Maps

McCoy 15-minute quadrangle.

Geologic Maps

Ferguson, Muller, and Roberts, 1951a, Geologic map of the Mount Moses quadrangle, Nevada, scale 1:125,000.

Access

From Winnemucca, 55 miles east on U.S. Highway 40 to Battle Mountain and junction with State Highway 8a. From there, it is 12 miles south on State Highway 8a to light-duty road leading south- west about 10 miles to Fish Creek Mountains. A dirt road leads 8 miles south to the McCoy district on the east side of the mountains.

Extent

Small placers were worked in the near vicinity of the Gold Dome mine, one of the group of mines northeast of the site of McCoy (approximately sec. 2, T. 28 N., R. 42 E., unsurveyed).

Production History

Small placer gold production has been recorded for 3 years, 1924, 1935, and 1939. The district was first located in 1914, and some unrecorded placer gold was probably obtained soon after.

Source

The placer gold was presumably derived from erosion of the lode-gold deposits in the area that contain free gold. The Gold Dome mine is a replacement deposit in diorite and contains abundant free gold. The placer gold recovered from the area in 1924 was 756 fine.

Literature

Schrader, 1934: Notes past small-scale placer-mining activity near Gold Dome mine; describes geology and lode deposits.

U.S. Geological Survey, 1924: Fineness of placer gold recovered in McCoy district.

Meadow Valley Mountains District

Overview

County: Lincoln

Commodities: gold, silver, uranium

Comments

Located east of U.S. Highway 93.

References

Tingley, 1989c, p. 5

Mellan Mountain District

Overview

County: Nye

Discovered: 1930

Commodities: gold, silver

Comments

This district is located in the vicinity of Mellan Mountain, an area of two joined hills near the old townsite of Mellan in Cactus Flat, about 13 miles east of the Cactus Range.

References

Kral, 1951, p. 131; Cornwall, 1972, p. 38; Tingley and others, 1997, p. 7-50

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