G
Guest
Points for Prospectors.
(B T O. BARCAY SMITH.)
Men only search for gold when the more comfortable ways of earning a livelihood fall them. It was this driving force of economic necessity that sent men from the towns and cities In the past, and led to the discovery of many of Australia's richest gold fields.
History is now repeating itself. Almost dally news comes of another gold discovery, and lured by the success of others, thousands of men throughout Australia, who are not content to merely hang about the cities and towns and eke out an existence on a Government dole, are leaving for goldfields, old and new, in search of the precious metal.
In support of the statement that gold-seeking is the last resort of men made desperate by unemployment, I advance the following Interesting figures:
In the "gold rush" year of 1852, Australia's total gold production was valued at 12,279,000. In the following years It steadily declined until It reached 5,231,000 in 1891. This decline was due to the fact that In the cycle of prosperity prior to 1890, men renounced the hardships of mining camps for the comforts of towns and cities, where work was available.
Then came the last great depression In Australia-commencing In 1890. It was world- wide In its ramifications. Prices of wool fell alarmingly, and on top of this came the great drought of 1892, and the following year the "bank smash." But the point that interests us to-day Is that as soon as depression set in, men went back to search for their first love-gold. It is claimed that over 100,000 men in Australia were engaged in gold production back in the 'nineties. New reefs were discovered almost every day, including the Wyalong field (1893), which yielded in six I years 181,268 ounces, valued at 712,358; the Hillgrove field (about 1892), which in seven years produced 251,991 ounces of free gold valued at approximately 900,000; and the Wentworth goldfield (near Orange), which gave a total of 224.703 ounces, worth 796,000, from 1892 to 1899, and several others. Properly directed labour will lead to further valuable developments over the whole length and breadth of our auriferous areas.
This intense gold-seeking activity In New South Wales was typical of all States after the last economic depression, and the happy sequel was that Australian gold production in- creased at the rate of about one million sterling per year until it reached the record figure of 16,302,000 in 1902. From that year a very gradual decline set In, and as the new cycle of prosperity gathered momentum, gold production went down and down until it reached the miserable figure of 1,807,000, In 1929-the lowest recorded since the discovery of gold In 1851.
GOLD STILL WAITING.
Some may conclude that this decline was due to the fact that gold production Is based on a law of diminishing return. Many authorities, on the other hand, hold the view that the mineral resources of Australia have scarcely been "scratched." The 629,659,000 worth of gold that has already been won from the fields of Australia is a mere bagatelle, they affirm, compared with the gold that still awaits the Midas touch of the prospector and the gold-mining company. The geology of Australia bustles with indications favourable to persistent gold production. Briefly, these Indications are in the age of our sedimentary rocks and the abundance of igneous intrusions over wide areas.
It is quite reasonable to assume, therefore, that there are still vast gold resources in Australia awaiting development. The chief reason for the great falling-off in Its production was undoubtedly the "borrow, boom, and bust" policy of successive Governments, which lured men away from the comfortless life of the open spaces to the soft cushions of the cities. This policy also Increased production costs to a point that made the working of scores of mines unprofitable. Gold production decreased in the same ratio as Australia became puffed up with bogus prosperity.
THE PROSPECTOR'S CHANCES.
Thousands of men In this State to-day are turning to the quest for gold as a means of tiding themselves and their families over the lean years ahead. All classes will again unite in the camaraderie of the goldfield, from the basic wager to the brief less barrister, the skilled artisan out of a Job to the young doctor whom the Great God Depression has denied a practice. All these, and more, will be caught up In the gold fever that seems to come just as regularly as the cycles of prosperity and depression.
These men are reading every day where some fortunate prospector has made a small fortune, but their first and greatest question is whether or not they will be able to make a bare living.
Thirty years ago (1901), gold production gave employment, officially, to 70,972 men, and unofficially, to another 30,000, but in 1928 gold seeking only gave employment to 5686. It Is not unlikely that 100,000 men throughout the Commonwealth will be earning a livelihood in gold production within the next two years.
Let me at the outset of these articles sound a timely warning to those who possess no practical knowledge of prospecting for gold. The men who go away, ill-equipped with no experience, to search for this precious, but illusive, metal in some remote reef are courting disappointment. Reef mining calls for knowledge based on practical experience, and every party of amateur prospectors should have at least one practical man among their number to save them from misdirected effort and ultimate failure.
KNOWLEDGE REQUIRED.
Before setting out in the actual search for gold, men should make themselves familiar with the following points:
How to use a prospecting dish correctly, i.e.,
1. how to pan alluvial gold.
2.How to Identify, broadly, Igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks, particularly such igneous rocks as granites, diorites, feldspars, porphyries, and felsites.
3. How to identify gold, and be sure that it isn't "new chum's gold," pyrites or golden
flakes of mica.
4.The specific gravity (weight) of minerals and rocks.
5.How to sample ores for assay purposes, so that the portion taken may fairly represent the whole body.
6. How to construct a cradle and sluice box for washing alluvial deposits.
The Department of Mines at George-street North, Sydney, gives demonstrations on most of the above points every day, and is doing great work to cope with the host of inquirers after information. To those who cannot avail themselves of this export advice, I suggest that they get In touch with some competent prospector In their locality, who is generally only too happy to pass on, to the best of his ability, all that he knows.
Of course, while a certain amount of geological knowledge Is advisable, one must not over-emphasise Its Importance. Neither geologists nor experienced prospectors possess powers of divination, and do not pretend to know exactly where payable gold will be found. At most, they can only Indicate where gold is likely to occur, or even say authoritatively where it will not be found In payable quantity. The slogan of the old prospectors was that "gold Is where you find It.
The element of luck plays a tremendous, and a romantic, part in gold finding, and the inexperienced might strike a rich alluvial patch or a gold-bearing shoot of quartz near where the most competent prospector, following all the orthodox Indications strikes a "duffer." i.e., a shaft that produces nothing. Still, this is the exception rather than the rule. As In every other field of enterprise, a "little training Is worth a world of straining." and the "new chum" on the prospecting field Is well advised to acquire all the knowledge he can with a view to making his chances of success more favourable.
The Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday 21 February 1931
(B T O. BARCAY SMITH.)
Men only search for gold when the more comfortable ways of earning a livelihood fall them. It was this driving force of economic necessity that sent men from the towns and cities In the past, and led to the discovery of many of Australia's richest gold fields.
History is now repeating itself. Almost dally news comes of another gold discovery, and lured by the success of others, thousands of men throughout Australia, who are not content to merely hang about the cities and towns and eke out an existence on a Government dole, are leaving for goldfields, old and new, in search of the precious metal.
In support of the statement that gold-seeking is the last resort of men made desperate by unemployment, I advance the following Interesting figures:
In the "gold rush" year of 1852, Australia's total gold production was valued at 12,279,000. In the following years It steadily declined until It reached 5,231,000 in 1891. This decline was due to the fact that In the cycle of prosperity prior to 1890, men renounced the hardships of mining camps for the comforts of towns and cities, where work was available.
Then came the last great depression In Australia-commencing In 1890. It was world- wide In its ramifications. Prices of wool fell alarmingly, and on top of this came the great drought of 1892, and the following year the "bank smash." But the point that interests us to-day Is that as soon as depression set in, men went back to search for their first love-gold. It is claimed that over 100,000 men in Australia were engaged in gold production back in the 'nineties. New reefs were discovered almost every day, including the Wyalong field (1893), which yielded in six I years 181,268 ounces, valued at 712,358; the Hillgrove field (about 1892), which in seven years produced 251,991 ounces of free gold valued at approximately 900,000; and the Wentworth goldfield (near Orange), which gave a total of 224.703 ounces, worth 796,000, from 1892 to 1899, and several others. Properly directed labour will lead to further valuable developments over the whole length and breadth of our auriferous areas.
This intense gold-seeking activity In New South Wales was typical of all States after the last economic depression, and the happy sequel was that Australian gold production in- creased at the rate of about one million sterling per year until it reached the record figure of 16,302,000 in 1902. From that year a very gradual decline set In, and as the new cycle of prosperity gathered momentum, gold production went down and down until it reached the miserable figure of 1,807,000, In 1929-the lowest recorded since the discovery of gold In 1851.
GOLD STILL WAITING.
Some may conclude that this decline was due to the fact that gold production Is based on a law of diminishing return. Many authorities, on the other hand, hold the view that the mineral resources of Australia have scarcely been "scratched." The 629,659,000 worth of gold that has already been won from the fields of Australia is a mere bagatelle, they affirm, compared with the gold that still awaits the Midas touch of the prospector and the gold-mining company. The geology of Australia bustles with indications favourable to persistent gold production. Briefly, these Indications are in the age of our sedimentary rocks and the abundance of igneous intrusions over wide areas.
It is quite reasonable to assume, therefore, that there are still vast gold resources in Australia awaiting development. The chief reason for the great falling-off in Its production was undoubtedly the "borrow, boom, and bust" policy of successive Governments, which lured men away from the comfortless life of the open spaces to the soft cushions of the cities. This policy also Increased production costs to a point that made the working of scores of mines unprofitable. Gold production decreased in the same ratio as Australia became puffed up with bogus prosperity.
THE PROSPECTOR'S CHANCES.
Thousands of men In this State to-day are turning to the quest for gold as a means of tiding themselves and their families over the lean years ahead. All classes will again unite in the camaraderie of the goldfield, from the basic wager to the brief less barrister, the skilled artisan out of a Job to the young doctor whom the Great God Depression has denied a practice. All these, and more, will be caught up In the gold fever that seems to come just as regularly as the cycles of prosperity and depression.
These men are reading every day where some fortunate prospector has made a small fortune, but their first and greatest question is whether or not they will be able to make a bare living.
Thirty years ago (1901), gold production gave employment, officially, to 70,972 men, and unofficially, to another 30,000, but in 1928 gold seeking only gave employment to 5686. It Is not unlikely that 100,000 men throughout the Commonwealth will be earning a livelihood in gold production within the next two years.
Let me at the outset of these articles sound a timely warning to those who possess no practical knowledge of prospecting for gold. The men who go away, ill-equipped with no experience, to search for this precious, but illusive, metal in some remote reef are courting disappointment. Reef mining calls for knowledge based on practical experience, and every party of amateur prospectors should have at least one practical man among their number to save them from misdirected effort and ultimate failure.
KNOWLEDGE REQUIRED.
Before setting out in the actual search for gold, men should make themselves familiar with the following points:
How to use a prospecting dish correctly, i.e.,
1. how to pan alluvial gold.
2.How to Identify, broadly, Igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic rocks, particularly such igneous rocks as granites, diorites, feldspars, porphyries, and felsites.
3. How to identify gold, and be sure that it isn't "new chum's gold," pyrites or golden
flakes of mica.
4.The specific gravity (weight) of minerals and rocks.
5.How to sample ores for assay purposes, so that the portion taken may fairly represent the whole body.
6. How to construct a cradle and sluice box for washing alluvial deposits.
The Department of Mines at George-street North, Sydney, gives demonstrations on most of the above points every day, and is doing great work to cope with the host of inquirers after information. To those who cannot avail themselves of this export advice, I suggest that they get In touch with some competent prospector In their locality, who is generally only too happy to pass on, to the best of his ability, all that he knows.
Of course, while a certain amount of geological knowledge Is advisable, one must not over-emphasise Its Importance. Neither geologists nor experienced prospectors possess powers of divination, and do not pretend to know exactly where payable gold will be found. At most, they can only Indicate where gold is likely to occur, or even say authoritatively where it will not be found In payable quantity. The slogan of the old prospectors was that "gold Is where you find It.
The element of luck plays a tremendous, and a romantic, part in gold finding, and the inexperienced might strike a rich alluvial patch or a gold-bearing shoot of quartz near where the most competent prospector, following all the orthodox Indications strikes a "duffer." i.e., a shaft that produces nothing. Still, this is the exception rather than the rule. As In every other field of enterprise, a "little training Is worth a world of straining." and the "new chum" on the prospecting field Is well advised to acquire all the knowledge he can with a view to making his chances of success more favourable.
The Sydney Morning Herald
Saturday 21 February 1931
