Inventory of Arizona mining records

AZGS has been inventorying the historical and technical files we acquired through the merger with the Arizona Dept. of Mines & Mineral Resources last year.   Digital librarian Casey Brown is working with Nyal Niemuth, who joined us from ADMMR, with the help of a pair of student interns to complete a comprehensive cataloging of the documents, reports, maps, and files, and then to georeference them all as part of the digitizing effort.

Last week, we posted inventories in the online AZGS Document Repository of three of the collections that fill rooms in our Phoenix office.  This gives a flavor of the type and breadth of files we are digitizing.

Roland Mulchay

Roland Mulchay was the chief geologist for the Anaconda mining company at Cananea. He either examined or received submittals and professional reports on many properties located in the southwestern U.S., northern Mexico and throughout the world. The collected files principally cover Arizona, Utah and Mexico. 

Reconstruction Finance Corporation Arizona records

In the 1930’s the Reconstruction Finance Corporation was created by the Federal Government to finance the development and operation of gold, silver and tin mines. Field engineers visited the mines, talked to the owners, discussed plans, and advised owners when necessary if plans were not detailed enough. They also made recommendations as to whether or not the loan should be granted. These files are the result of their investigations. 

 

Cambior Exploration USA Inc mining collection

The collection comprises the Arizona mineral exploration files (mostly for gold and copper) of Cambior Exploration USA Inc. The collection also includes information from acquired companies Westmont Mining and Nicor Mineral Ventures Inc. It contains exploration data as well as submittal information gathered during the 1980s through 1999.

This project is funded by a one-time state appropriation and a grant from the USGS National Geological & Geophysical Data Preservation Program.  We expect it will take three years or more to finish cataloging and digitizing all the ADMMR files and getting them online for free viewing and downloading.