Precambrian Sulphide Deposits

Abstract

This book is dedicated to Howard S. Robinson, who was born and educated in the United States, but who spent his professional career in Canada with McIntyre Porcupine Mines, concentrating on Precambrian mineral deposits. Although his career in mineral exploration was distinguished, his major contribution to earth science was probably as one of the founders of the Geological Association of Canada, an institution to which he made a bequest in his will. With this background, the strong emphasis on Canadian Precambrian mineral deposits should come as no surprise; of the 23 papers in this book, 21 are solely or primarily devoted to Canadian deposits. The two exceptions—those describing the Balmat, N.Y., zinc mines (at times the largest zinc producer in the United States) and the Crandon, Wisconsin, volcanogenic zinc‐copper massive‐sulfide deposit (the largest deposit of its kind found in the 1970s)—are each within a couple of hundred kilometers of the Canadian border. Although the title of the book is more expansive than the actual topics discussed, Canada is rich in Precambrian rocks and ore bodies, and Canadian scientists have been especially alert to tectonic influences in the formation of mineral deposits. These features, plus the fact that the country contains a very well exposed expanse of Archean rocks which is the largest in the world, facilitate the study of early crustal evolution and make the book of particular interest to geophysicists.