Advertised as the “last hunt at the Historic Cliff Mine”, rockhounds paid a generous fee to have this tailings pile moved around so they have a better chance to uncover a long-ignored piece of copper. I found a different treasure there which I’ll tell you about, but first some basic history.
Everyone waits with anticipation to be let onto the rock pile.
The backhoe was busy at the Cliff digging trenches for us to hunt.
The Cliff mine was the first successful copper mine in the Copper Country. The mine is at the now-abandoned town of Clifton in Keweenaw County. Mining began in 1845, and the Cliff was the most productive copper mine in the United States from 1845 through 1854. Large-scale mining stopped in 1878. The cliff mine was a vertical lode (the vein ran almost straight down). I can only imagine how much trouble mining was at this location.
View from the top of the Cliff pile.
Diggers on the rockpile.
There are tailings piles remaining at the Cliff. One of the piles has been re-worked for copper in the 60’s but still contains small specimens. The backhoe was in constant operations on these piles and we are happy we pid for that extra deep digging. The cliff has not been dug this deep in recent years. Everyone was getting small chunky copper pieces. There could be copper crystals on a few I found, but I have to clean them up. The Cliff Mine area has been worked for copper by natives since prehistoric times. Chisel Chips from these prehistoric mining operations can still be found at the Cliff and most people found a few using sensitive metal detectors. I found a couple, but they were small. Valuable ones can reach 12″ or more. I saw no one that found one that size.
There are also silver and copper crystals at the Cliff and silver-copper “halfbreeds”. I might have some of these, but I need to acid off the Calcite from the specimens I found. It was a very pleasant day on the rock pile.
OK, since you have patiently read this far I’ll tell you what my best find was. I was searching with the metal detector, but I still look around for other minerals I can make jewelry out of. 
I saw a gorgeous apple green Prehnite just sitting on the surface. Other searchers were so concentrating on copper and listening to their metal detectors, that they totally missed this treasure. Of course not everyone makes jewelry, but it still was the finest piece of gem grade prehnite I have ever found in the Keweenaw. I just can’t wait to get it home and make something from it! Stay tuned for the cutting and wrapping!
Next blog: Last night we went to the new Seaman Museum’s open house and picnic. This will be reported later. We are having a real problem finding Internet Hot Spots up here so I can get this blog done. But even though these may be a couple days late I hope you still appreciate these reports.