Spruce Creek has been known as a placer deposit (see RM033) since before 1915, when the earliest known report of mining evidence was made by Maddren (1915). The Spruce Creek occurrence may be the potential source for Spruce Creek placer gold. Bedrock in the Spruce Creek drainage includes thermally metamorphosed Jurassic volcanic rocks developed around a mid-Cretaceous granitic stock (Box and others, 1993; Wenz, 2005). Massive, unlayered porphyritic mafic flows varying in color from dark green to reddish to a distinct dark purple and interbedded layered, intermediate to felsic pyroclastics and poly-lithic volcaniclastics were encountered in two drill holes drilled by Nyac Gold LLC in 2013 (Flanders, 2013). The alteration observed in these two drill holes was silicification and silica-carbonate flooding adjacent to quartz veining and stockwork tectonized zones. Mineralization was found in yellowish-white calcite and quartz veining and translucent chalcedonic quartz veining in a foliated tectonized zone (Flanders, 2013).

Open-cut placer mining took place along lower Spruce Creek until about 1920. Some of this work included a 280-foot long, 15- to 20-foot wide, and 10-foot-deep trench built as a bedrock drain. In the 1990s, Nyac Mining Company mined extensively on Spruce Creek from surface cuts.

In 2005-2006, a soil sampling program was conducted covering approximately half of a subtle aeromagnetic anomaly. In 2010, stream sediment samples were collected at Spruce Creek by Nyac Gold LLC (Flanders, 2013).