Show WHERE THE EXPERT FALLS DOWN I low ilow many mining experts and assayers can one name who have made fortunes in mining in the west it is a notable fact that out of the many mining engineers and ass assayers ayers to be found in this intermountain region but very few have struck it rich to give a plausible reason for this failure would be as difficult as it would be to answer the question how old was ann it would naturally seem as though with their education along mining and engineering lines with their familiarity mili arity with ores and formations that many of our mining experts and assayers alsaye s i should have made fortunes through opportunities tuni ties offered along the lines of their profession but they just the same they are successful when serving on the staff of mining companies when determining the value of ore samples sample s submitted for testing and assaying but when it comes to acting on their own judgment and for themselves they seem as helpless as a wall street banker during his first visit underground almost daily instances could be cited where the expert and the assayer have opportunity thrust upon them only to be carelessly thrust aside and ignored for instance take the case of the camp bird mine at ouray colorado which made maae tom walsh both rich and famous one of the owners of this property was an assayer of recognized ability he had been interested te rested in the camp bird f for or a long time and had helped in the performance of considerable sid erable development work As a matter of fact the property had been patented one d day ay tom walsh came along and picked up some of the rock on the mine dump in it he saw what he believed to be free gold the owners thought it was pyrites of iron when he had made a test of the ore walsh found that he was right in his conclusions later on he obtained a bond on the property was invested with the title by the payment of a few housand dollars out of which he afterwards took several millions when jim butler discovered the mizpah at tonopah To nevada he took some of the droppings crop pings of the ledge to an assayer to have them tested promising to give the assayer an interest in the property it if the ore carried any values after the departure of butler the assayer threw the samples out of the window as ag he was satisfied they were valueless butler was disgusted when he heard what had been done and then gave a similar lot of samples to another assayer with the result that the great tonopah district was given to the world a district that is now producing its millions yearly and which is paying thousands upon thousands in dividends once in a while however there is an exception to the general rule as far as mining experts and assayers assay ers are concerned in 1890 when hall and his indian half breeds from the colville reservation went up into british columbia and located the silver king mine hall gave a colville assayer a lot of samples to test together with a thirteenth interest in the find if he would make the assays essays the property proved a valuable one and was sold to an english syndicate for so that the assayer received for doing about an hours work |