Mount Tenabo

Mount Tenabo (Shoshoni: "Lookout Mountain")[3] is the principal peak in the Cortez Mountains. The mountain is of cultural and religious significance to the Western Shoshone people.

Mount Tenabo
Mount Tenabo is located in Nevada
Mount Tenabo
Mount Tenabo
Location of Mount Tenabo in Nevada
Highest point
Elevation9,157 ft (2,791 m) NAVD 88[1]
Prominence3,153 ft (961 m)[1]
Coordinates40°09′47″N 116°35′05″W[2]
Geography
LocationEureka County, Nevada, U.S.
Parent rangeCortez Mountains
Topo mapUSGS Cortez

Etymology

There are various theories as to the name's etymology. The mountain may have been named by New Mexicans after an ancient pueblo, or Tenabo may be a Paiute word, meaning of "dark colored water".[4]

Geography

The summit elevation of Mount Tenabo is 9,157 feet (2,791 m), which is 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above the surrounding valleys. Its base is covered with scrub pine. The summit and 1,500 feet (460 m) below is overgrown with grass and shrubs. Approximately 25 miles (40 km) to the north is the Humboldt River and its valley. Eastward, there are hills and valleys. To the west is the Smoky Valley, Mount Hope, Bunker Hill, and other peaks of the Toiyabe Range.[5] Mount Tenabo, east of and near the north end of the Toiyabe Range, is about 30 miles (48 km) south of Beowawe.[6]

At an area approximately 3,000 feet (910 m) above the mountain's base, a vein of silver-bearing quartz cuts through obliquely, penetrating into the valley after for 18,650 feet (5,680 m). Its width is 400 feet (120 m). This vein (stratum) contains ore beds, and is encased in crystalline limestone.[5]

History

Silver ore was discovered at Mount Tenabo in 1862 by a group of New Mexicans.[7] By the later half of the 1860s, there were at least 20 working mills.[5] In 2008, the Te-Moak tribe, the Timbisha tribe and others sought an emergency injunction that would have halted further development of Barrick Gold's Cortez Hills mining operation which includes facilities on the slopes of Mount Tenabo. As of July 2016, mining continues while the BLM prepares a court-ordered supplemental environmental impact statement.[8]

References
  1. "Mount Tenabo, Nevada". Peakbagger.com. Retrieved 2014-01-28.
  2. "MountTenabo". Geographic Names Information System. United States Geological Survey, United States Department of the Interior. Retrieved 2011-05-19.
  3. Zanjani, Sally (September 1, 2000). A Mine of Her Own: Women Prospectors in the American West, 1850-1950. U of Nebraska Press. pp. 210–. ISBN 978-0-8032-9916-0. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
  4. Carlson, Helen S. (1 January 1974). Nevada Place Names: A Geographical Dictionary. University of Nevada Press. pp. 230–. ISBN 978-0-87417-094-8. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
  5. Browne, John Ross (1869). Resources of the Pacific slope: A statistical and descriptive summary of the mines and minerals, climate, topography, agriculture, commerce, manufactures, and miscellaneous productions, of the states and territories west of the Rocky mountains (Public domain ed.). H. H. Bancroft and Co. pp. 409–. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
  6. Nevada (Terr.). Legislative Assembly (1899). Appendix to Journals of Senate and Assembly (Public domain ed.). pp. 37–. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
  7. Hall, Shawn (December 1993). Romancing Nevada's past: ghost towns and historic sites of Eureka, Lander, and White Pine counties. University of Nevada Press. pp. 80–. ISBN 978-0-87417-228-7. Retrieved 2012-01-05.
  8. Harding, Adella (July 19, 2010). "BLM issues notice on Cortez Hills study". Elko Daily Free Press. Retrieved 2014-01-28.
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