[LB006024], Letter from Thomas Alva Edison to Frank McLaughlin, May 17th, 1880
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Title
[LB006024], Letter from Thomas Alva Edison to Frank McLaughlin, May 17th, 1880
Editor's Notes
Your reports and telegrams were duly rec'd. The black sand process is now perfected. I would like to commence on black sand which is as pure as can be had. What about the boats? We are working at a process that we think will do away with the mill entirely and this is the reason why the plans are not sent to youl We propose after taking black sand out to take the gold out of the silica in the same way. If ic an be made to work it will be enormous. Keep a lookout for black sand--make enquiries of miners regarding deposits of the same and make a record of them. I should like some lava black sand and more of the boat sand. Have Powers save all the black sand in cleaning up so we can work it. There was very little gold in the tailings you sent from Bryan Tyson. After you left, Tyson sent us a bag of pyrites which he panned out from his mines in the clean up. I panned some on the [?] but could see not gold but the Dr in tests found an enormous quantity of gold. We thought it must be in the pyrites. We picked some pyrites out & found no gold. This puzzled us grealy but I soon found out that the gold was covered with the thickest coat of rust that I have ever yet seen. It required 5 days to eat off the rust without dissolving the gold but I suppose there is not much of this. The Spring Valley tailings you sent were quite poor, evidently the gold is down deeper--still what you sent could be concentrated by sifting up to [separator?]. At present our blk sand process is absolutely perfect. Now if you can furnish us a deposit of blk sand we are ready for business. What about tht party that promised to send ou a large boulder of pyrites a piece of which you brought here? Also how about that place in a tunnel where you said it was 200 feet of black sand. The North Bloomfield sent me some black sand which contained $5.50 to the cubic yard. There was more gold in the Spg Vallye tailings than in the lower flume which you sent me.
Author
Recipient
Date
1880-05-17
Type
Folder/Volume ID
LB006-F
Microfilm ID
80:287
Document ID
LB006024
Publisher
Thomas A. Edison Papers, School of Arts and Sciences, Rutgers University