Purchasing a Mining Claim - Mining Education Lesson

JM2855

Greenie
Mar 27, 2016
17
35
Colorado
Detector(s) used
Whites MXT All Pro, Minelab
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
As an adjunct to my post in the Hard Rock Mining forum about the Mary Clough Mines that I owned and explored in Nevada, I want to post a very important lesson for ANYONE out there who is considering purchasing a mining claim from anyone or any company (including Gold Rush Expeditions, and many others who have sprung up in their wake trying to make money at copying their business model).

This is a true story of facts here and I want anyone who is considering purchasing a mining claim, ESPECIALLY a HISTORIC, DOCUMENTED with historic documents mining claim, from anyone or any company;

A year or so ago, there was "a gold mining claim sale company" we will call Company X, that had a very particularly, historic, documented historic producer 20 acre lode mining claim for sale (we will call it the Little Boy Mine). Company X had this claim for sale on their website for say $300,000.00. There were pictures on Company X's website of a caved in adit with some water draining out of it, completely caved in or closed purposely by the BLM/Forrest service with boulders, rubble sealing it shut. There was some old days mining trash, old timbers and junk laying about the claim. The grabber was that this was the ...and there was an old historic (authentic) document from a state mineralogist from say 1910 stating that they had visited the Little Boy mine in mining district "XXXX DISTRICT" in XXXX county Montana. The historic report stated that mining was active on this claim and they had taken out 100,000 ounces of gold and 200,000 ounces of silver from vein that was 5-8' thick with paying ore averaging 4' of that vein, and that it was located in the XXXX mining district in that particular county. This mining district mind you is 45 miles by 50 miles in size.

In 1911 there were say....50,000 tons of ore blocked for mining inside the mine, at an average of 0.5 OPT Au that were left in reserves at the Little Boy Mine (Sounds pretty good right?). We have pictures of old mining trash. There is a wooden building that likely housed some miners that is caved in. There are pieces of busted relics and rusted shovel ends. We have an obviously caved in completely shut adit that there are waste rock outside of. We have a historic report showing that there was in fact 50,000 tons of blocked ore at a determined, assayed average for Au. The historic report can be verified by going to the Montana State mineral archives, research, etc. It's authentic. Nice...we have a great find here.

So I get permission to go and visit this mine thinking I may be interested in something like THIS rich 20 acre lode claim!

When I get out there in the mountains of Montana, I find the Little Boy mine adit, staked by Company X, their signs up at the caved adit. Yep this is it.

Wait...there's another adit with waste rock 100 yards over there. And there's another one...and another one. To my count in a day's hiking around this "Little Boy" mine that is for sale for $300,000.00, there are 23 actual adits spread over a square mile or two...all of which have mining trash around them, every single one of them caved or bulldozed closed, every one of them with waste rock piles outside of the adit 50 feet away. Now this is interesting.

So I look on the BLM website and check the status of active claims in the area to ensure that if I purchase this claim, and want to claim additional ground over the vein, that I'm not stepping on someone else's ground. The website shows me like 9 active claims in the area, including the Little Boy mining claim for sale by Company X.

Wait a minute, there's the Little Boy mine there too. And there's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual from Oregon. There's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual in Arizona and another couple by another mining claim sale company. WT Fudge???

Checking the internet I found that there were FIVE individual LITTLE BOY GOLD MINES for sale for anywhere from $5,000.00 to the bigger mining sale company's $300,000.00!!! All with the very same historical document that the Company X had on their website selling the claim!!!

Now, how on earth could there be 9 Little Boy Gold Mines, all using the same historic document, 5 of them already on the internet for sale stating that THEY owned the REAL Little Boy gold mine in their 20 acre lode claim!!!

Ok....NOWWWWWW I GET IT. Click!

Company X found the historic document on the internet. They went to the mining district which is 50 miles across. They stated one of the CAVED, CLOSED, SEALED adits with trash around it and waste rock outside of it, put their signs up and said THIS....is the REAL Little Boy gold mine that the document refers to. But then several other companies and individuals all did the same exact thing, all claiming that their 20 acre lode claim they had for sale was the one that the historic document referred to. Yet the active Little Boy Claims were spread across 3.5 miles! Now will the REAL Little Boy gold mine, please stand up!

I found that everyone was trying to cash in on the old historic document and the fact that there were supposedly documented reserves in it, yet not one adit was open that you could actually get into and see the vein or take actual vein samples for assay. Obviously I enjoyed my hike in the mountains but I was educated that back in 1910, they DID NOT USE GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEMS TO MARK THE GPS COORDINATES OF THEIR MINING CLAIMS. And...if the Little Boy mine was operational in a mining district 50 miles across, and there are dozens of adits and waste rock piles everywhere, WHICH one of them (that you can't get into and inspect or sample) would be the real one that the historic document referred to??

And these companies and individuals are selling them for thousands and in some cases, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars, when they themselves can't be sure where the ACTUAL adit with THE vein mentioned in a report is actually located in.

LESSON HERE is that anyone can find a historic document on line or in a county office that states there was an old producing gold mine in XXXX district that turned out zillions of ounces of gold and hence it's worth millions upon millions. But with the adits caved, no real record as to which of the 50 adits spread across miles of land, they can claim ANY of them and state that it is in fact THE historic gold mine in the document.

Hence my WARNING WARNING WARNING for prospective buyers of mining claims from ANYONE or ANY company -Especially those documented with old historic documents. Unless there are pictures from the 1920's showing the exact head frame that match pictures of that headframe today, then you can't be sure of WHICH adit or shaft is the true historic producer that may still hold potential.

Again- GET YOUR LICENSED PROFESSIONAL GEOLOGIST INVOLVED BEFORE YOU SPEND $1 and if the company or individual is honest and does business with integrity, they won't mind at all having your geologist inspect the property before you purchase it.

Lesson well learned on my part- Now shared so that others are aware of of this is easily a SCAM that is being pulled off on HISTORIC MINES being sold all over the country!
Jack W. Moore
 

Upvote 5

Clay Diggins

Silver Member
Nov 14, 2010
4,862
14,180
The Great Southwest
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
Thanks Jack. Very good advice. This might be a good topic to pin on the forum. We need more awareness of this problem. With this type of exposure the many groups running these scams all over the west will find it unprofitable to continue. :thumbsup:

Just one part of your example puzzles me. Why do you think all those "Little Boy" mines were claimed by different people? wink* wink* nudge nudge. :cat:

Buyer Beware.

Heavy Pans
 

OP
OP
JM2855

JM2855

Greenie
Mar 27, 2016
17
35
Colorado
Detector(s) used
Whites MXT All Pro, Minelab
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
At the time, those who were advertising the 'historic claim' for sale, all had a copy of the exact same state geologist's report from back in the day, and all were trying to capitalize on the the historic report by using it to show that the claim that they were selling had 'proven value'. According to the dates on the BLM website, GRE was not the first one to file a claim in that area by the exact name. Though I did not save the LR2000 report that I pulled back then, I do remember someone from Oregon filed the first claim by that name, and GRE followed by approximately a year later. Once it was posted on the internet, one could simply Google the report and find it on the Montana state archives so it was fairly easy for others to download the same report, stake a claim on a caved adit in the general area of that mining district and put 'er up for sale with the historic report downloaded.

I'm sure you can imagine my reaction when the ACTIVE claims page came up and I saw there was a list of them, all the same name, all active all filed over about 1.5 year time frame and all claiming to be the old historic mine site. Boy did that open my eyes on just how easy it would be to pull the fast move by doing that. It also educated me that unless someone has some very specific evidence on the exact location, such as a headframe in a 1920's photo with the mine name on it, in that district and the headframe still stands recognizably to point to the actual location, the fact remains that they didn't mark their mining claims back then with GPS coordinates and maps were spotty at best if they even exist on file.

So....it is REALLY a Buyer Beware situation. I have talked to dozens of people who either bought claims off GRE or someone else and had NO CLUE that there claim may actually NOT be the one that is in fact documented in some historical report of an old producer in that particular area.

In my opinion and my opinion only, GRE 'mostly' sells cool old mining history. If there are old buildings, headframes, mining carts, rails, trommels, rusting crushers, old 1940's trucks or what have you, then it's an interesting claim that looks cool. It's claimed and sold without an economic geologist inspection, review and testing results report.

If there is a nice looking quartz vein that could very likely have gold and silver in it, and it's on yonder hill side with ZERO mining activity around, no historic anything, you very likely will NOT see GRE claiming and selling it, regardless of it being a very solid mineral location with visible minerals present. There just isn't the cool history there... no romantic sizzle to it.

You are exactly right and I agree with you completely. There does need to be more and more awareness to the public out there about these things. If you know how to PIN something like this on the forum (I don't get on here much and am not the expert on these forum tools as yet), then feel free to do so.

In fact, I would encourage all the readers that read this to share it in whatever way they can to begin educating the public at large at just how easily it can be for ANY company or individual to sell a great historic gold mine and proven producer, without really knowing for sure if that one 20 acre lode claim is the ACTUAL historic producer.

Thanks for the input. Share as you like. Others out there need to learn from the mistakes I've made and educated myself on, and I really don't mind learning lessons from those who've been there done that in the field also. This is why we have a great community of folks on these forums. To share information that helps everyone on the whole.

Jack
 

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SaltwaterServr

Sr. Member
Mar 20, 2015
471
642
Texas
Primary Interest:
Other
This really does need to be a forum sticky; best under the general prospecting page.

@TNMountains, could this be stickied?
 

Last edited:

Tnmountains

Super Moderator
Staff member
Jan 27, 2009
18,701
11,663
South East Tennessee on Ga, Ala line
🥇 Banner finds
1
Detector(s) used
Tesoro Conquistador freq shift
Fisher F75
Garrett AT-Pro
Garet carrot
Neodymium magnets
5' Probe
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
This really does need to be a forum sticky; best under the general prospecting page.

@TNMountains, could this be stickied?

It is in the moderation section now. Thanks.
 

Tnmountains

Super Moderator
Staff member
Jan 27, 2009
18,701
11,663
South East Tennessee on Ga, Ala line
🥇 Banner finds
1
Detector(s) used
Tesoro Conquistador freq shift
Fisher F75
Garrett AT-Pro
Garet carrot
Neodymium magnets
5' Probe
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Hey guys there ya go. Just got in from work hope this helps other members. If you all want it locked as a read only I will clean all comments and lock it or we can keep it open. Just holler at me.
 

QNCrazy

Hero Member
Sep 30, 2013
537
961
Motherlode, CA
Detector(s) used
Gold Bug Pro
Thanks TN. I was looking on CL, Modesto, CA a few weeks back, and saw a couple of claims around my area for sale. Tey all had the same price, $1500. I recognized the name of one the creeks that I didn't recognize as having a rich history. So I did a little research and discovered there has never been a single claim in the area, ever! no history at all. I was already thinking this was a scam. I started digging a little deeper and found the name of the claim owner. I did a search of the owners name in one of the online data bases. His name hit on thirteen claims, 10 currently in his name. All 10 of the claims were filed in April, 2018, with no previous history. Upon researching the other three claims, each of them indicated he transferred the claims to someone else which led me to beleive there were three victims with worthless claims. There's some real snakes out there.

I shared this information with our club at one of our meetings. During the break, one of the newer members who was thinking about purchasing a cliam, came up to me and shook my hand, thanking me for saving them from making a big mistake.

Great Topic! Great Information! Do your research before buying claims.
 

KevinInColorado

Gold Member
Jan 9, 2012
7,037
11,369
Summit County, Colorado
Detector(s) used
Grizzly Goldtrap Explorer & Motherlode, Gold Cube with trommel or Banker on top, Angus Mackirk Expedition, Gold-n-Sand Xtream Hand pump
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
Similarly an acquaintance of mine bought a claim (sight unseen) because it was on the famous producer Tarryall Creek. The problem? This new claim was too far upstream. No gold when u r upstream of the source deposit!! Oops.
 

IDdesertman

Full Member
Dec 8, 2007
178
207
Boise, Idaho
Detector(s) used
GPX4500, Gold Bugs
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
In my opinion and my opinion only, GRE 'mostly' sells cool old mining history. If there are old buildings, headframes, mining carts, rails, trommels, rusting crushers, old 1940's trucks or what have you, then it's an interesting claim that looks cool. It's claimed and sold without an economic geologist inspection, review and testing results report.

If there is a nice looking quartz vein that could very likely have gold and silver in it, and it's on yonder hill side with ZERO mining activity around, no historic anything, you very likely will NOT see GRE claiming and selling it, regardless of it being a very solid mineral location with visible minerals present. There just isn't the cool history there... no romantic sizzle to it.

That hits the nail on the head on pretty much all of the claims you see for sale on the internet. An old busted down shack, some rusty junk, and a hole in the ground seems to be what sells.
 

Golden_Crab

Sr. Member
Mar 28, 2016
253
183
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
I remember shopping around for claims in the lower 48, encountered one deal that sounded pretty legit so I check into it more. Everything sounded great until I asked for some proof of the deposits extents, all I got was some reference to a USGS report from the late 1900s... I ask for something more substantial and magically the perfect businessman became hostile. These are the same reports I use to zero in on an area for exploration so it was kinda funny.

I expect in this day and age if you are going to ask for millions for a mining project, you'll have some proof of what's there using recent technology or logs documenting previous mining (exploration - hell shovels and pans and lots of holes would be acceptable if the math checks out) on YOUR behalf. If they don't have that much, keep truckin.
 

Maitland

Full Member
Mar 15, 2010
172
159
Black Hills, South Dakota
Detector(s) used
White's Silver Eagle, Fisher Gold Bug 2
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
I've seen this same type of stuff several times with placer and lode claims for sale on eBay. I've even ran into a few people over the years who have wallowed into our local prospecting club or contacted us after having purchased one of these claims online, sight unseen. They're always super ecstatic to learn the art of prospecting and to find out how much gold possibly lies on their newly-acquired mining claim. The funny thing is, most of the claims I've seen for sale online (located in the mountains where I live) are usually in places that aren't historically producing. I mean yeah, I suppose you could find a few specks here and there, but nothing that is worth the hundreds or thousands of dollars that these people usually shell out for these online scams. Interest in gold panning and prospecting is usually quickly lost by the said buyers once they find out that even the best-producing spots here in the Black Hills are long overworked and don't pay out much like they did 143 years ago during the gold rush boom. For anyone interested in finding some real and serious amounts of gold here, it's usually going to be something in the hard rock category and most people don't have the knowledge nor the capital to even scratch the surface on that, myself included. Another thing that baffles me is how many of these "newbies" buying these claims online think they're getting surface real estate, and don't grasp the concept that it's only for the mineral rights and that's it; then again, I suppose the scammers can get a quicker bite if they don't go out of their way to make it well known that it's mineral rights and nothing else that is being offered for sale.
 

QNCrazy

Hero Member
Sep 30, 2013
537
961
Motherlode, CA
Detector(s) used
Gold Bug Pro
Am I right or wrong?

Last March, 2018, I was looking to stake a claim. Did my due diligence and placed my location notice. However, an emergency came up and I had to use the funds and wasn't able to complete the process. I told a member of my club that if their other club wanted it to go ahead and take it. Fast forward to February 2019, I checked LR200, and my land matters, put boots on the ground and didn't see any notices and nothing was filed. I told that same member that I was going to go ahead and file the claim. He told me that the other club got the claim. Knowing this wasn't true, on March 14, 2019, my wife and I placed our location notice, and took pictures of me doing so. I haven't paid BLM as of yet as I know I have 90 days to complete the process. I was out at the claim two weeks ago and noticed a small green post, easily missed, smaller than a t-post with a clear plastice tube with paperwork inside of it. I actually saw the tube before I saw the post. Out of curiosity, i checked the paperwork. It was a location notice dated August 24, 2018. The paper was moldy so I know it had been there through winter. I took pictures of the documents and the dates. Today, I checked my land matters and there is a claim listed, filed March 14, 2019. Same claim name as on the old location notice. However, according to BLM, only one of the names on the location notice matches the names on LR2000.

Based on this information, if I continue to file the claim, and register with the county, am I the rightful claimant? I believe I am and can prove it. What course of action would you recommend?

Mike
 

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QNCrazy

Hero Member
Sep 30, 2013
537
961
Motherlode, CA
Detector(s) used
Gold Bug Pro
Thanks but I have decided not to pursue it. Not worth the time or money. I will be haveing a face to face with the jackhole(not the claim holder) who was responsible though.
 

Buzz in California

Jr. Member
Apr 22, 2019
30
43
Yuba City California
Detector(s) used
GPZ7000
EQUINOX800
MOSSBERG 12 GA.
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
Thanks TN. I was looking on CL, Modesto, CA a few weeks back, and saw a couple of claims around my area for sale. Tey all had the same price, $1500. I recognized the name of one the creeks that I didn't recognize as having a rich history. So I did a little research and discovered there has never been a single claim in the area, ever! no history at all. I was already thinking this was a scam. I started digging a little deeper and found the name of the claim owner. I did a search of the owners name in one of the online data bases. His name hit on thirteen claims, 10 currently in his name. All 10 of the claims were filed in April, 2018, with no previous history. Upon researching the other three claims, each of them indicated he transferred the claims to someone else which led me to beleive there were three victims with worthless claims. There's some real snakes out there.

I shared this information with our club at one of our meetings. During the break, one of the newer members who was thinking about purchasing a cliam, came up to me and shook my hand, thanking me for saving them from making a big mistake.

Great Topic! Great Information! Do your research before buying claims.

When I purchased my claim, I met the seller at the county offices where the employee behind the counter completed the paperwork and confirmed that the seller was the present owner and the claim was legally registered in my name, that was when I handed the agreed upon cash over to the seller.
 

Bluegrassriver

Jr. Member
Oct 18, 2008
52
16
Kentucky near the Ohio River!
As an adjunct to my post in the Hard Rock Mining forum about the Mary Clough Mines that I owned and explored in Nevada, I want to post a very important lesson for ANYONE out there who is considering purchasing a mining claim from anyone or any company (including Gold Rush Expeditions, and many others who have sprung up in their wake trying to make money at copying their business model).

This is a true story of facts here and I want anyone who is considering purchasing a mining claim, ESPECIALLY a HISTORIC, DOCUMENTED with historic documents mining claim, from anyone or any company;

A year or so ago, there was "a gold mining claim sale company" we will call Company X, that had a very particularly, historic, documented historic producer 20 acre lode mining claim for sale (we will call it the Little Boy Mine). Company X had this claim for sale on their website for say $300,000.00. There were pictures on Company X's website of a caved in adit with some water draining out of it, completely caved in or closed purposely by the BLM/Forrest service with boulders, rubble sealing it shut. There was some old days mining trash, old timbers and junk laying about the claim. The grabber was that this was the ...and there was an old historic (authentic) document from a state mineralogist from say 1910 stating that they had visited the Little Boy mine in mining district "XXXX DISTRICT" in XXXX county Montana. The historic report stated that mining was active on this claim and they had taken out 100,000 ounces of gold and 200,000 ounces of silver from vein that was 5-8' thick with paying ore averaging 4' of that vein, and that it was located in the XXXX mining district in that particular county. This mining district mind you is 45 miles by 50 miles in size.

In 1911 there were say....50,000 tons of ore blocked for mining inside the mine, at an average of 0.5 OPT Au that were left in reserves at the Little Boy Mine (Sounds pretty good right?). We have pictures of old mining trash. There is a wooden building that likely housed some miners that is caved in. There are pieces of busted relics and rusted shovel ends. We have an obviously caved in completely shut adit that there are waste rock outside of. We have a historic report showing that there was in fact 50,000 tons of blocked ore at a determined, assayed average for Au. The historic report can be verified by going to the Montana State mineral archives, research, etc. It's authentic. Nice...we have a great find here.

So I get permission to go and visit this mine thinking I may be interested in something like THIS rich 20 acre lode claim!

When I get out there in the mountains of Montana, I find the Little Boy mine adit, staked by Company X, their signs up at the caved adit. Yep this is it.

Wait...there's another adit with waste rock 100 yards over there. And there's another one...and another one. To my count in a day's hiking around this "Little Boy" mine that is for sale for $300,000.00, there are 23 actual adits spread over a square mile or two...all of which have mining trash around them, every single one of them caved or bulldozed closed, every one of them with waste rock piles outside of the adit 50 feet away. Now this is interesting.

So I look on the BLM website and check the status of active claims in the area to ensure that if I purchase this claim, and want to claim additional ground over the vein, that I'm not stepping on someone else's ground. The website shows me like 9 active claims in the area, including the Little Boy mining claim for sale by Company X.

Wait a minute, there's the Little Boy mine there too. And there's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual from Oregon. There's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual in Arizona and another couple by another mining claim sale company. WT Fudge???

Checking the internet I found that there were FIVE individual LITTLE BOY GOLD MINES for sale for anywhere from $5,000.00 to the bigger mining sale company's $300,000.00!!! All with the very same historical document that the Company X had on their website selling the claim!!!

Now, how on earth could there be 9 Little Boy Gold Mines, all using the same historic document, 5 of them already on the internet for sale stating that THEY owned the REAL Little Boy gold mine in their 20 acre lode claim!!!

Ok....NOWWWWWW I GET IT. Click!

Company X found the historic document on the internet. They went to the mining district which is 50 miles across. They stated one of the CAVED, CLOSED, SEALED adits with trash around it and waste rock outside of it, put their signs up and said THIS....is the REAL Little Boy gold mine that the document refers to. But then several other companies and individuals all did the same exact thing, all claiming that their 20 acre lode claim they had for sale was the one that the historic document referred to. Yet the active Little Boy Claims were spread across 3.5 miles! Now will the REAL Little Boy gold mine, please stand up!

I found that everyone was trying to cash in on the old historic document and the fact that there were supposedly documented reserves in it, yet not one adit was open that you could actually get into and see the vein or take actual vein samples for assay. Obviously I enjoyed my hike in the mountains but I was educated that back in 1910, they DID NOT USE GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEMS TO MARK THE GPS COORDINATES OF THEIR MINING CLAIMS. And...if the Little Boy mine was operational in a mining district 50 miles across, and there are dozens of adits and waste rock piles everywhere, WHICH one of them (that you can't get into and inspect or sample) would be the real one that the historic document referred to??

And these companies and individuals are selling them for thousands and in some cases, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars, when they themselves can't be sure where the ACTUAL adit with THE vein mentioned in a report is actually located in.

LESSON HERE is that anyone can find a historic document on line or in a county office that states there was an old producing gold mine in XXXX district that turned out zillions of ounces of gold and hence it's worth millions upon millions. But with the adits caved, no real record as to which of the 50 adits spread across miles of land, they can claim ANY of them and state that it is in fact THE historic gold mine in the document.

Hence my WARNING WARNING WARNING for prospective buyers of mining claims from ANYONE or ANY company -Especially those documented with old historic documents. Unless there are pictures from the 1920's showing the exact head frame that match pictures of that headframe today, then you can't be sure of WHICH adit or shaft is the true historic producer that may still hold potential.

Again- GET YOUR LICENSED PROFESSIONAL GEOLOGIST INVOLVED BEFORE YOU SPEND $1 and if the company or individual is honest and does business with integrity, they won't mind at all having your geologist inspect the property before you purchase it.

Lesson well learned on my part- Now shared so that others are aware of of this is easily a SCAM that is being pulled off on HISTORIC MINES being sold all over the country!
Jack W. Moore
 

Bluegrassriver

Jr. Member
Oct 18, 2008
52
16
Kentucky near the Ohio River!
Great story! Keep in mind even if you find old documents, statements, and assays, that back in the early days some officials were on the take and it was more difficult to prosecute them back them. Reports full of exaggerations or tales in which money under table was paid to the "inspector" or geologist for a good report.
 

bigckerman

Newbie
Jan 3, 2023
2
0
As an adjunct to my post in the Hard Rock Mining forum about the Mary Clough Mines that I owned and explored in Nevada, I want to post a very important lesson for ANYONE out there who is considering purchasing a mining claim from anyone or any company (including Gold Rush Expeditions, and many others who have sprung up in their wake trying to make money at copying their business model).

This is a true story of facts here and I want anyone who is considering purchasing a mining claim, ESPECIALLY a HISTORIC, DOCUMENTED with historic documents mining claim, from anyone or any company;

A year or so ago, there was "a gold mining claim sale company" we will call Company X, that had a very particularly, historic, documented historic producer 20 acre lode mining claim for sale (we will call it the Little Boy Mine). Company X had this claim for sale on their website for say $300,000.00. There were pictures on Company X's website of a caved in adit with some water draining out of it, completely caved in or closed purposely by the BLM/Forrest service with boulders, rubble sealing it shut. There was some old days mining trash, old timbers and junk laying about the claim. The grabber was that this was the ...and there was an old historic (authentic) document from a state mineralogist from say 1910 stating that they had visited the Little Boy mine in mining district "XXXX DISTRICT" in XXXX county Montana. The historic report stated that mining was active on this claim and they had taken out 100,000 ounces of gold and 200,000 ounces of silver from vein that was 5-8' thick with paying ore averaging 4' of that vein, and that it was located in the XXXX mining district in that particular county. This mining district mind you is 45 miles by 50 miles in size.

In 1911 there were say....50,000 tons of ore blocked for mining inside the mine, at an average of 0.5 OPT Au that were left in reserves at the Little Boy Mine (Sounds pretty good right?). We have pictures of old mining trash. There is a wooden building that likely housed some miners that is caved in. There are pieces of busted relics and rusted shovel ends. We have an obviously caved in completely shut adit that there are waste rock outside of. We have a historic report showing that there was in fact 50,000 tons of blocked ore at a determined, assayed average for Au. The historic report can be verified by going to the Montana State mineral archives, research, etc. It's authentic. Nice...we have a great find here.

So I get permission to go and visit this mine thinking I may be interested in something like THIS rich 20 acre lode claim!

When I get out there in the mountains of Montana, I find the Little Boy mine adit, staked by Company X, their signs up at the caved adit. Yep this is it.

Wait...there's another adit with waste rock 100 yards over there. And there's another one...and another one. To my count in a day's hiking around this "Little Boy" mine that is for sale for $300,000.00, there are 23 actual adits spread over a square mile or two...all of which have mining trash around them, every single one of them caved or bulldozed closed, every one of them with waste rock piles outside of the adit 50 feet away. Now this is interesting.

So I look on the BLM website and check the status of active claims in the area to ensure that if I purchase this claim, and want to claim additional ground over the vein, that I'm not stepping on someone else's ground. The website shows me like 9 active claims in the area, including the Little Boy mining claim for sale by Company X.

Wait a minute, there's the Little Boy mine there too. And there's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual from Oregon. There's another Little Boy active mining claim by an individual in Arizona and another couple by another mining claim sale company. WT Fudge???

Checking the internet I found that there were FIVE individual LITTLE BOY GOLD MINES for sale for anywhere from $5,000.00 to the bigger mining sale company's $300,000.00!!! All with the very same historical document that the Company X had on their website selling the claim!!!

Now, how on earth could there be 9 Little Boy Gold Mines, all using the same historic document, 5 of them already on the internet for sale stating that THEY owned the REAL Little Boy gold mine in their 20 acre lode claim!!!

Ok....NOWWWWWW I GET IT. Click!

Company X found the historic document on the internet. They went to the mining district which is 50 miles across. They stated one of the CAVED, CLOSED, SEALED adits with trash around it and waste rock outside of it, put their signs up and said THIS....is the REAL Little Boy gold mine that the document refers to. But then several other companies and individuals all did the same exact thing, all claiming that their 20 acre lode claim they had for sale was the one that the historic document referred to. Yet the active Little Boy Claims were spread across 3.5 miles! Now will the REAL Little Boy gold mine, please stand up!

I found that everyone was trying to cash in on the old historic document and the fact that there were supposedly documented reserves in it, yet not one adit was open that you could actually get into and see the vein or take actual vein samples for assay. Obviously I enjoyed my hike in the mountains but I was educated that back in 1910, they DID NOT USE GLOBAL POSITIONING SYSTEMS TO MARK THE GPS COORDINATES OF THEIR MINING CLAIMS. And...if the Little Boy mine was operational in a mining district 50 miles across, and there are dozens of adits and waste rock piles everywhere, WHICH one of them (that you can't get into and inspect or sample) would be the real one that the historic document referred to??

And these companies and individuals are selling them for thousands and in some cases, HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of dollars, when they themselves can't be sure where the ACTUAL adit with THE vein mentioned in a report is actually located in.

LESSON HERE is that anyone can find a historic document on line or in a county office that states there was an old producing gold mine in XXXX district that turned out zillions of ounces of gold and hence it's worth millions upon millions. But with the adits caved, no real record as to which of the 50 adits spread across miles of land, they can claim ANY of them and state that it is in fact THE historic gold mine in the document.

Hence my WARNING WARNING WARNING for prospective buyers of mining claims from ANYONE or ANY company -Especially those documented with old historic documents. Unless there are pictures from the 1920's showing the exact head frame that match pictures of that headframe today, then you can't be sure of WHICH adit or shaft is the true historic producer that may still hold potential.

Again- GET YOUR LICENSED PROFESSIONAL GEOLOGIST INVOLVED BEFORE YOU SPEND $1 and if the company or individual is honest and does business with integrity, they won't mind at all having your geologist inspect the property before you purchase it.

Lesson well learned on my part- Now shared so that others are aware of of this is easily a SCAM that is being pulled off on HISTORIC MINES being sold all over the country!
Jack W. Moore
I have owned 5 different mines and you must have it professionally surveyed to make sure what you are buying is there and legal.
 

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