O, Lucky Chance!

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XL, Issue 20, 13 May 1908, Page 37

O, Lucky Chance!

WHEN ACCIDENTS HAVE FOUND FORTUNES. In 1903 the town of Cobalt consisted of four rough little huts, inhabited by lumbermen. To-day there are six thousand people, fine shops, hotels, and the place will, in a few years, probably rank as the most important mining centre in British North America. Cobalt—“Silvertown” as some call it—is one more page in the wonderful and never-dying romance of the mine. The marvellous mineral riches of the neighbourhood were disclosed purely 7 by chance. Two navvies at work on an extension of the Northern Ontario Railway had words. One lost his temper, and hurled an axe at the other. The latter sprang aside just in time, and the missile hit and split a boulder lying just behind him. Others interfered, and while the quarrel was being patched up, a bystander noticed a brilliant shining streak in the centre of the broken boulder. It was pure silver! Now there are a dozen paying silver mines around Cobalt, one of which has already returned £300,000. Nickel also lias been discovered: and what is perhaps more valuable than all—a wonderful deposit of that very valuable mineral, cobalt. Cobalt’s chance-found treasures bring to mind the way in which the Haemskirk, the great tin lode of Tasmania, was struck. A man named William Mayne farmed in a small way near I laemskirk, and his good wife assisted by managing the dairy. One morning an obstinate cow refused to return to its pasture, and insisted in wandering into an orchard where it had no business. Mrs. Mayne tried “shooing’’ it away, but as the creature would not budge, she at last picked up a stone to throw at it. The stone was not very large, but its weight was so extraordinary that Mrs. Mayne was amazed, and carried it into the house. Analysis proved it to be practically pure oxide

of tin. The lode was sought and found, and from its face were taken samples, which yielded seventy-four per cent pure tin.

It is a very curious coincidence that the goldmine at Mokihjuni Creek, in New Zealand, was also discovered by an arrested stone throw. A ship’s fireman named Albert Winter left his ship to work in the mines at Grannity Creek, New Zealand. One day, when out for a walk, he picked up a stone to throw at a woodpigeon. The stone was not only heavy, but had shining specks in it. Winter at once pegged out a claim, which he subsequently sold for the pleasant little sum of £75,000.

The greatest discovery of borax ever made was the result of the purest ehanee. Some twenty years ago a man named Aaron Winters was prospecting for gold or other precious metals in that, American inferno known as Death Valley. He had his wife with him, and they two worked together until their provisions were at an end. Then, bitterly disappointed at their ill-success, they started back towards civilisation. The first night they camped in Ash Valley. Here they lit a fire and prepared to cook their supper. Mrs. Winters called her husband’s attention to the peculiar green tinge of the flames. He did not speak, but with shaking hands scratched away the earth, and suddenly shouted, “We’re rich, Rose, we’re rich! It’s borax!” He was right. They subsequently sold their claim for a very large sum. This is not the only occasion upon which fire has proved a good friend to the prospector in search of minerals. About eighteen months ago two women —Mrs. Wilson and Miss Spencer—were looking for gold in Southern California. They camped one night on the bank of a creek close to the edge of the Mojave desert. When they had lit their fire, columns of thick, suffocating black smoke after a time began to rise, and Miss Wilson exclaimed, in alarm, “The ground’s all afire!” They had, in fact, camped on top of a rich deposit of asphalt, hidden by a thin layer of sand. The lucky ladies have made a large fortune from their find.