The Company is a Nevada-based, gold and silver mining company with extensive,
contiguous property in the historic Comstock and Silver City mining districts.
The Comstock District is located within the western portion of the Basin and
Range Province of Nevada, between Reno and Carson City. The Company began acquiring
properties and developing projects in the Comstock District in 2003. Since then,
the Company has consolidated a substantial portion of the historic Comstock
District, secured permits, built an infrastructure and brought exploration projects
into production.
Because of the Comstock District’s historical significance, the geology
is well known and has been extensively studied by the Company, our advisors
and many independent researchers. We have expanded our understanding of the
geology of the project area through vigorous surface mapping and drill hole
logging. The volume of geologic data is immense, and thus far the reliability
has been excellent, particularly in the various Lucerne Mine areas. We have
amassed a large library of historic data and detailed surface mapping of Comstock
District properties and continue to obtain historic information from private
and public sources. We use such data in conjunction with information obtained
from our current mining operations, to target geological prospective exploration
areas and plan exploratory drilling programs, including expanded surface and
underground drilling.
Our Lucerne Resource area is located in Storey County, Nevada, approximately
three miles south of Virginia City and 30 miles southeast of Reno. Our Dayton
Resource area is located in Lyon County, Nevada, approximately six miles south
of Virginia City. Access to the properties is by State Route 341/342, a paved
road.
The Company continues evaluating and acquiring properties, expanding its footprint
and exploring all of our existing and prospective opportunities for further
exploration, development and mining. The near-term goal of our business plan
is to maximize intrinsic stockholder value realized, per share, by continuing
to acquire mineralized and potentially mineralized properties, exploring, developing
and validating qualified resources (measured, indicated and inferred) and reserves
(proven and probable) that enable the commercial development of our operations
through extended, long-lived mine plans that are economically feasible and socially
responsible, including both the Lucerne and Dayton Mine plans, with both surface
and underground development opportunities. We also plan to develop longer-term
exploration plans for the remaining areas, which include the Spring Valley,
the Northern Extension, Northern Targets and Occidental areas, subsequent to
and in the case of the Spring Valley, concurrent with the exploration and development
of Lucerne and Dayton.
The Company has identified six distinct target areas on its land holdings and
has focused, to date, solely on the Lucerne Resource area (including surface
and underground) and the Dayton Resource area. We anticipate developing exploration
plans for the remaining areas, which include the Spring Valley, Northern Extension,
Northern Targets, and Occidental Target areas, subsequent to the exploration
and development of Lucerne and Dayton. The Company’s existing heap leach
processing facility for gold and silver was redesigned and expanded in late
2013 and again in the fourth quarter of 2014, to accommodate future production
plans.
The Lucerne Resource area has been the primary focus of the Company’s
exploration and development efforts since 2007. It includes the previously mined
Billie the Kid, Hartford and Lucerne mining claims, and extends east and northeasterly
to the area of the historic Woodville bonanza, Succor and Lager Beer claims
and north to the historic Justice and Keystone mines. The Company has the key
mining permits required for mining this area. The Lucerne Resource area is approximately
5,000 feet long, with an average width of 600 feet, representing less than three
percent of the land holdings controlled by the Company and is the site of our
current production activities and ongoing exploration and development program.