TOOLS FOR THE TREASURE HUNTER

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 22, 25 July 1936, Page 27

TOOLS FOR THE TREASURE HUNTER

The modern divining-rod business is booming, says the "New York Times." In the last five years more than 300 inventions for geophysical prospecting have been patented in the U.S.A. and in foreign countries.

Modern divining rods, unlike the witching sticks of the ancients, employ gravitational, magnetic, seismic, electrical, and geothermal principles. One inventor would explore the interior of the earth electrically from an aeroplane.

Government geologists attribute the increased activity to the higher prices of gold, silver, copper, oil, and other minerals and metals.

For years Uncle Sam has been studying the possibilities of hearing above ground the murmurings of buried treasure; Long ago he-concluded "that the bent-twig type of divining rod, used for centuries to detect ore, water, .and witches, is a fraud.

But geophysical prospecting, he says, is based upon definite physical principles. It is entirely possible, for example, to locate, by means of magnetic and electrical surveys, such hidden ore bodies as/have strong magnetic properties. ' -

In- response to the increased public interest, the Bureau of Mines recently surveyed the patents which have been issued on geophysical prospecting in the United States, England, Canada, Australia, Germany, France, and Russia. Descriptions of 545 patents issued in the various countries have been listed, but the bureau is non-committal as to the efficacy of these devices. The Bureau states only that "there probably is no better way for students and others interested in the science of geophysical prospecting to become better acquainted with its background i than through-the patent literature^