February 14, 2007 The morning started off very dreary and cold. I was selected to take the group south of town to several fluorite mines while Dave Millis and Herb went to check out the possibility to get us in to a new location with the property owners. The weather was coming from the northwest to the southeast and looked like a lot of rain was falling over our intended locations south of town. We all decided to wait till the skies started to clear. At around 9:30AM we decided to leave for the fluorite mines. When we arrived at the first fluorite location the wind as blowing hard and it then started to sleet. This happened about five or six times that day. We all poked around the few dumps at site #1 for a while but no one seemed to have much success. Dave and Herb showed up just as we were gathering up to leave for the second location. Dave was able to get permission for an afternoon dig at the old Banner mine south of town. We all signed the liability release form for the afternoon field trip and then took off for the second fluorite site. This location was much better than our first stop with everyone finding some or a lot of green fluorite. These were the same two locations which I had visited by myself back in 2003. |
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| [2003] Starting about five miles south of Lordsburg there are more than a dozen abandon fluorite mines and prospects covering the rolling hill sides. I decided to visit the furthest one first and work my way back toward the interstate. This dirt road was pretty good most of the 8.2 miles to my first stop. Just off to the right side of the road I found a couple of eight to ten foot high tailing piles and a rather small(50 yards) ?prospect? cut which had been partially backfilled. I immediately noticed that I couldn't see any sun bleached fluorite laying on the tailing piles. Bad sign! I went into the partially filled in prospect ditch and found one low spot where someone had been digging. There I found some very small pale green fluorite chips and nothing else. I decide to move on to the second site a little over 2.2 miles back toward the freeway. Along the way I could see numerous small abandon pits. This second location was on a "two track" side road? that went up and over the distant hills. Four wheel drive - slow going - bad dip - rough . . . At the top of the first hill I parked and immediately saw a number of small pits. When I started to get close to this digging area I could see lots of sun faded fluorite pieces all over the ground. Very good sign! On top of the hill I found an old abandon hole about 15 feet across and 20 feet deep. I moved on to some shallow holes where small seams of green fluorite could be seen. A lot of rock but not a lot of fluorite. I moved up to the top of the next small hill where I could see a small piece of concrete slab poured beside another shaft. This one was larger and filled in on a slope to where you could easily climb in and walk down to inspect the walls. Big seams of green and some purple fluorite were exposed in several locations in the pit. I first had to knock off enough of the surface material to get back to fresh unaltered fluorite. Can't wait to see how this stuff fluoresces. After collecting a couple of pounds of pale green and some purple massive crystals, I decide it was time to get back on the road. Four wheel drive - slow going - bad dip - rough . . . |
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2003
 The rather small prospect cut at site #1 |
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2007
 We are pictured here signing the liability release form for the afternoon field trip to the Banner Mine. |
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2003
 Big seams of green and some purple fluorite were exposed in several locations in pit #2. |
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2007
 Bill and Judy Ruddick working on a fluorite seam in an old prospect pit. That's SLEET falling in this picture. |
