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Show Local Firms Encourage Development Of Mining Properties in Area With the uranium boom which began a few decades de-cades ago, the western US again experienced a new-surge new-surge in its economy. Since geologists were not entirely prepared for the event and knew little of tire possibilities possibili-ties for the use of this new ore, many of the major discoveries dis-coveries in the initial period were made by cowboys, Indians In-dians or amateur prospectors. prospec-tors. Many men who started out as amateurs soon found themselves more than just casually interested in their BiG'bby.- Their hobby and hopes of wealth in the new fields opening up in uranium prompted many men to give up their jobs in search of an El Dorado. In December of 1965 C. L. "Buster" Stew- ' art was prospecting on a part time basis, in 1967 he quit his job with a local retail re-tail firm and became a full time promoter. Mr. Stewart is now the president of a prospering company called Intermouti-tain Intermouti-tain Minerals. In the near future, he and his associates, Jim1 Walker. John McDonald, McDon-ald, and Ray Tibbetts, will be forming yet another corporation, cor-poration, Rocky Mountain Nuclear. Encourage Investments The job of these men is to encourage others to invest, develop, and operate mining properties. Mr. Stewart and his associates employ a force of 7 men and have operated op-erated in four states and presently have a producing mine in Colorado. They also have two planes to speed up their exploration. Mr. Stewart stated that the day of the amateur with a geiger counter is over since the geiger counter is a shallow detecting device with a range of only three to four feet. Modern exploration explora-tion is for ore at depths from 2G0 to 3000 feet. Stewart and his crews stake claims on promising land. These claims, called lode claims, are 500 by 1500 feet. Since there is no actual work done on the claim it. must be proven, and prospective pros-pective buyers may drill, after af-ter making an agreement with the promoter. These agreements are either an outright sale of the claim r.r a promise of a royalty from any marketable ore found. Likely Formations Claims are not staked anywhere any-where the operator happens to be. There must be an oc currance of a formation that is likely to yield an ore. In this area, uranium is found primarily in the Morrison and Chinle formations. If there is activity in the area, a promoter may decide to stake a claim or a number of claims near existing ones. Buyers are not interested in doing business with a promoter pro-moter who shows no real knowledge of his business There must be evidence Uiat the seller may know where to find the valuable ores. Uranium comes in many colors from yellow, close to an outcropping, to black in the deeper primary ore. Those who are exploring or proving a claim drill and drop a tube to measure radioactivity ra-dioactivity into the hole or test the "fines'' from the drill site. From this information informa-tion they may decide to continue con-tinue with this particular hole or move to another site nearby. To be economically feasible feasi-ble a mine often must demonstrate dem-onstrate a quantity of other minerals as well as uranium ore. At the present time, prtmc ers or miners do not generally consider less than .10 uranium and 3 per cent vanadium as profitable enough en-ough to mine. Although in (Some cases where mining j ( , ) W ' ! ' ''J , ' L , ' .4 hJ . ... . v-"l ; ! -i Buster Stewart, president of Intermountain Minerals, and a piece of select high grade ore containing copper, vanadium, vana-dium, silver and uranium. This ore could bring a price of $1,130 per ton if all these ores could be extraed. - E . Samples of the various appearances of uranium ore. The ore comes in a variety of colors from bright yellow to black. and hauling costs are low enough .10 of uranium may be enough to mine. Proving and Exploring If a mine shows enough promise and appears to be economic enough to be operated oper-ated by a small company, the promoter may keep it and work it himself. If not, the claim will not be worked work-ed and will be sold. The buyer, buy-er, then will hire a company dealing in exploration to do the actual exploration and proving of the claim. Gary Lee of Gary Lee and Associates is one of these men who proves claims'. He jokingly tells of his "foolproof" "fool-proof" method of discovering discover-ing an ore body worth development. devel-opment. "You move you; camp into an area and driii several holes. If you find nothing no-thing after lengthy exploration, explora-tion, you come back to camp and drill there and you w:ll be sure to hit a vein," he promises. Mr. Stewart remarked re-marked ruefully that the rather ra-ther farfetched method hai worked several times in th-j last few months. Problems in Promotion The vice-president of Intermountain In-termountain Minerals, Jim Walker, said that the uranium uran-ium business is now in the .exploration stage and . wdl later develop into deeper mining. Right now there is not too great a market !or fissionable materials, he .said but in the future as electric power companies turn to atomic reactors the . ore will be in great demand. At present time, power companies com-panies are fearful that the uranium reserve will not be great enough to meet their future needs. Mr. Walker says it would take about 1 million tons to supply a relatively rel-atively small generator. This amount would last for a number of years but wou.d eventually have to be replac- ed. Another reason for the lack of speed in the changeover change-over to atomic reactors iS that they have not proved to be as economical as was once hoped. The; cost of removing the uranium from the host ro; k can also be formidable, and this would kssen the amount of money obtained from Jic ore by the miner. Until all th. '.so problems are resolved, the promoter's El Dorado remains just over the next hill: but times aren't bad enough to discov-age discov-age these men of Intermountain Intermoun-tain Minerals from continu- '' ing their search |