New Mexico has some of the oldest mining areas in the United
States. Native Americans mined turquoise more than 500 years
before the arrival of the Spanish in the early 1600s. American
miners came to the Ortiz Mountains in New Mexico seeking gold in
1828, more than two decades before the California and Nevada
gold rushes. Some consider this the first Western gold rush.
While New Mexico’s mines never rivaled California’s or Nevada’s,
they left the same legacy of scattered abandoned mine sites
throughout the State. New Mexico has 140 hardrock mining
districts established mostly in the 1800s for the mining of (in
the order of value mined) copper, zinc, silver, gold, and lead
and from 1950-70 for uranium. About a half dozen of these mine
sites are still active, mining primarily copper, molybdenum,
gold, and silver. AML sites on BLM land near recreation
facilities and in high public use areas are identified as high
priority for closure. A site where a fatality or injury has
occurred receives the highest priority.