folds over the Penns Valley Narrows anticlinal at the end of the Little Buffalo mountain and returns to make a double outcrop in the narrow synclinal basin extending west from Cowan.
In this basin, in Lewis township, is two opposing outcrops of the Ore sandstone, dipping towards one another at angles of from 40°-60° are never more than three quarters of a mile apart, and contracting rapidly westward, they come together in Hartley township a little over a mile from the Lewis line, and from that point westward occupy the whole of the synclinal basin as one ridge and outcrop a mile and a half long.
Witner’s mine, on property of David Yohn, is located upon the northern outcrop of this synclinal in Lewis township about a mile east of the Hartley line, near a small branch of Buffalo creek. The bed mined here on a 55° S. E. dip is probably the Sand Vein; but the Ore sandstone, as well as the roof slates are so thoroughly decomposed in and around the mine as to be scarcely recognized. The ore has been largely changed to hematite, and occurs in soapstone clays in a double bed with 15″–20″ of ore on top; 8″–14″ of clay slate in the center and 4″–9″ of bottom ore, all overlying a decomposed sandstone.
This mine was worked 40 years ago, and had only been recently reopened by Mr. Witmer and 40 tons of ore sent upon trial to Bloomsburg. The ore seen did not appear very rich, and the clays adhere closely to it requiring a great amount of timbering in the mine. The drift is in 75 yards and stoped for 30′. Several thin beds of ore, 2″–6″ thick, overlie the two main benches, and give it the character of the Danville series, which indeed it may be. Should the ore be found of suitable character it could be well developed from this point, and loaded upon the broad gauge tramway of the Ryan & Thompson lumber operation, about 1½ miles east, whose track extends from the railroad below Mifflinburg into the valley of the North branch of Buffalo creek, where an extensive lumber operation is carried on.
The Mull property, ½ a mile east of Witmer’s mine, has
