Silver

This specimen, cut smooth on one side and left rough on the other, reveals a classic silver-bearing vein section from the historic Crown Reserve Mine in Cobalt, Ontario. The sawn face shows infillings of native silver intergrown with little arsenides within a carbonate vein matrix.

The Crown Reserve Mine was discovered in 1907 and became one of the notable producers in the early years of the Cobalt silver rush. Many of its ore veins extended beneath Kerr Lake, presenting considerable engineering challenges at the time. The mine ceased major operations by 1948, but in the 1960s, Kerr Lake was dewatered and the old waste piles and tailings were reprocessed by Glen Lake Silver Mines, recovering additional silver from the historic workings.

Today, the Crown Reserve site forms part of a tourist area near Cobalt, where visitors can still view remnants of the region’s rich mining past. This specimen serves as a tangible connection to that legacy, a classic example of Cobalt Camp silver–arsenide mineralization from one of the district’s historically significant operations.