THE ROMANCE OF THE RAND MINES

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume I, Issue 179, 15 July 1911, Page 4 (Supplement)

THE ROMANCE OF THE RAND MINES

I'p to 1881 there was scnrct-ly a snst pieion of gold in the Transvaal, and ;he country was regarded as a barren l mnd. lacking in all the resources which attract colonisation But in the year . mentioned a man named Arnold told ’ a farmer named Geldenhuis that there ■ was gold on his land. Geldenhuis did i r.ot believe it. but repeated the gossip and sold his farm t > two adventurous brothers named Struben. who put up a mill and began to work the greyish \ powdery dirt that has since proved t!i > richest gold ore the earth has ever

i shown. The Boer Government pro- ' chimed nine farms public goldfields. I Then the rush began. The Boers, always slow where enterprise wins out, ’ were unbelieving They could not j make up their minds to abandon the , certainty of row-punching for the uni certainty of mining, even with rich ’ claims crying for takers. A few set- • th-d on the Witwatersrand and went to Work ; Meantime the nows of the r find anread over the borders into English territory. The word made a sensation in (Capetown, and a hord« of adventurers at once set out. The news reached London, and started the adventurers there. Within a year nearly every

i working claim was under the spade, ’ and nearly nil were in En>.di-.h hand- . [ The Boers, on the spot, had made up ; their minds too late The workings of the Witwatersrand ‘ —White Water Range, in English-- ' v.ere thirty miles in length, uhen al! ! were developed. The gold was found ; ip a formation seen nowhere else in i the world Regular hed«. or ' reefs" ‘o- dry powdery conglomerate. in I thickness from two to twentv feet, ; are found throughout this district. The 1 Mick veldt is. the ore. Nowhere e!s-> ! <>;. earth is gold mined and worker! J s i easily or -o cheaply.