FRANKLIN K. LANE, Secretary UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY Bulletin 624 USEFUL MINERALS OF THE UNITED STATES COMPILED BY FRANK C. SCHRADER, RALPH W. STONE USEFUL MINERALS OF THE UNITED STATES. Compiled by FRANK C. SCHRADER, RALPH W. STONE, and SAMUEL SANFORD. INTRODUCTION. The volumes of the Geological Survey's annual report entitled "Mineral Resources of the United States" for 1882 and 1887 contain lists of the useful minerals of the United States. No similar list was published by the Survey in the succeeding quarter of a century or more until 1914. During that period, however, the mineral resources of the United States were enormously developed, the value of the total production having increased from $500,000,000 to over $2,000,000,000, and the investigations made by the United States Geological Survey and the State geological surveys added greatly to the knowledge of the natural resources of the country. Many changes in the mineral industry other than increase in production have taken place. Aluminum was not made in the United States in 1887, so that the deposits of bauxite, now the source of material that maintains a great industry, were untouched and were not included in the Survey's lists. Twenty-five years ago the annual imports of Portland cement were four times the domestic production, and the total quantity consumed was about 1,250,000 barrels. The production of natural rock cement was five times the combined production and imports of Portland cement. To-day the Portland cement industry is distributed generally over the United States, and the annual production amounts to more than 86,000,000 barrels. The production of natural rock cement and the imports of foreign cement are so small as to be negligible. These are only examples of notable changes in the mineral production of the United States and of correlated changes in the appraised value of some of the mineral deposits. The timeliness of the Survey's list of useful minerals1 issued in 1914 is indicated by the fact that the edition of 6,000 copies became exhausted in less than a year and that nearly 2,000 applications were made for additional copies. The rapidly growing demand for information regarding our mineral reserves has led to the publication 1 Sanford, Samuel, and Stone, R. W., Useful minerals of the United States: U. S. Geol. Survey Bull. 585, 1914. 5 |