Geologic map and sections of the Bowie Mountain South Quadrangle, Cochise County, Arizona
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Geology topics
Publications and source records attributed to Harald Drewes.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
The Santa Rita Mountains of southeastern Arizona are underlain, in part, by volcanic and sedimentary rocks and by many small intrusives, of Cenozoic age. These rocks provide a more complete geologic record than that of other ranges in the region, and consequently the Santa Rita Mountains are a useful reference area from which to develop the Cenozoic geologic history of the region. Many isotopic ages provide the basis for dating key units and add to the confidence in the interpretations of the geologic record of the rocks themselves. The rocks of the greatest potential economic interest are the Greaterville intrusives of the Helvetia and Greaterville mining districts and the quartz vein swarm of the Tyndall and Wrightson mining districts.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Explore the source record for details and available documents.
Geologic mapping of the Mount Wrightson quadrangle has been completed recently by the U.S. Geological Survey. As a result, I am able to present a summary (table 1) of the rocks exposed and to indicate their ages and relations with each other. The Mesozoic rocks are emphasized because the local geologic record of this era is more complete in the southern part of the Santa Rita Mountains than elsewhere in southern Arizona. For example, there is evidence to indicate that about 10,000 feet of volcanics (including pillow lava), eolian sandstone, and possibly even red beds was deposited during Triassic time and that these rocks were intruded by a monzonite stock before the end of that period. It is hoped that release of the data at this time, prior to the final publication by the U.S. Geological Survey, will stimulate in the geological community of southern Arizona a timely interest in some of the complex problems of the Mesozoic tectonic history. Solutions to these problems may suggest new approaches to minerals exploration in this region.
Turtlebacks are smooth, curved surfaces, which form north-northwestward-plunging elongate domes on the east side of Death Valley. These surfaces are roughly parallel to bedding or foliation of anticlines in Precambrian schist, gneiss, and marble. Late Cenozoic fan and playa deposits are faulted over these surfaces along the turtleback faults. Previously the turtleback faults have been interpreted as part of a thrust fault, perhaps the Amargosa thrust fault, that was arched after thrusting. They are interpreted here as individual normal faults younger than the thrust fault and, contrary to previous interpretations, much younger than the formation of the anticlines in the Precambrian rocks. The tectonic history of this unusual area is here considered to include the following events: (1) Precambrian folding of the Precambrian rocks; (2) post-Paleozoic and pre-middle(?) Tertiary Amargosa thrusting; (3) uplift and erosion of Paleozoic strata and the Amargosa thrust fault, down to the folded Precambrian rocks in the Black Mountains block; (4) Middle (?) Tertiary rhyolite extrusions and the accumulation of later Tertiary fan and playa deposits; (5) Pliocene or Pleistocene uplift of the Black Mountains relative to Death Valley, along the Black Mountains fault system, with consequent removal of support for the Tertiary deposits on the turtleback surfaces, and the development of the turtleback faults by normal faulting, or sliding, of the Tertiary sedimentary rocks down the turtleback surfaces toward Death Valley; and, (6) Pleistocene to Recent renewal of movement on the Black Mountains fault system.