Twitter

Books, Art, Music and Photography About Mining and Northern Topics

‘A very particular time and place in Canada’s history’: New book recalls Saskatchewan’s forgotten uranium mine – by Alex MacPherson (Saskatoon StarPhoenix – September 12, 2016)

http://thestarphoenix.com/

Almost nothing is left of the Gunnar uranium mine. What didn’t decay after the mine on the north shore of Lake Athabasca was abandoned more than five decades ago was later hauled away as part of a massive — and massively over-budget — cleanup operation. Patricia Sandberg, whose father and grandfather worked for Gunnar Mining Ltd., and who spent eight years of her childhood at the northern Saskatchewan mine, worries it will be forgotten altogether.

“It is a part of Canadian history that most people don’t know about, and I think it’s really important,” said Sandberg, whose new book, Sun Dogs and Yellowcake, chronicles the mine’s history and records the stories of the people who lived and worked there.

The Gunnar uranium mine, located about 800 kilometres north of Saskatoon, was discovered by prospectors working for Gilbert LaBine, the Ontario-born explorer who is widely considered the father of Canada’s uranium industry.

Read more

‘The Smartest Places on Earth’ – by Van Agtmael and Bakker – by Shawn Donnan (Financial Times – March 13, 2016)

https://www.ft.com/

An optimist’s guide to the rust belt revival

For years the dominant narrative about the American rust belt has been one of decline and decimation — a once-thriving industrial core turned into a dystopian wasteland by the winds of free trade and persistent undercutting by China.

But in The Smartest Places on Earth, former financier Antoine van Agtmael and journalist Fred Bakker make a courageous case for an alternative vision. What if the real story of the rust belt these days is one of reinvention? What if we ought to consider these regions “the emerging hotspots of global innovation”?

It is a courageous argument because it goes against the political grain in America. Eight years after the global financial crisis, the US is reaping the political damage of not just the crisis but also of the decades-long economic patterns blamed for hollowing out the manufacturing sector and the middle class.

Read more

‘The Geography of Genius,’ by Eric Weiner – by Ashlee Vance (New Your Times Sunday Book Review – January 8, 2016)

http://www.nytimes.com/

In the early 1960s, the Soviet Union tried to make a version of Silicon Valley from scratch. A city called Zelenograd came to life on the outskirts of Moscow and was populated with all manner of brainy Soviet engineers.

The hope — naturally — was that a concentration of clever minds coupled with ample funding would result in a wellspring of innovation and help Russia keep pace with California’s electronics boom. The experiment worked as well as one might expect. Few people will read this on a Mayakovsky-branded tablet or smartphone.

Many similar attempts have been made in the subsequent decades to replicate Silicon Valley and its abundance of creativity and ingenuity. Such efforts have largely failed. It seems near impossible to will an exceptional place into being or to manufacture the conditions that lead to an outpouring of genius.

Read more

Story of a forgotten town – by Alex Browne (Peace Arch News – August 5, 2016)

http://www.peacearchnews.com/

South Surrey writer Patricia Sandberg admits she has mining in her blood – although she claims her former career as a securities lawyer for mining companies came about more as a matter of accident, than design.

The fact remains that both her grandfather, Fred, and father Jack, were both deeply involved in the construction end of the mining industry and had an extended working relationship with 20th century Canadian prospector and mining pioneer Gilbert LaBine, first president of Eldorado Mining and Refining from the late 1920s until 1947.

The uranium boom of the late 1940s led LaBine to discover deposits of the metal on the shores of Lake Athabaska in Northern Saskatchewan. In the early 1950s he established Gunnar Mines there – and the company town that was built around it.

Read more

Cobalt’s silver boom and the rise of mining media in Canada – by Dr. Douglas Baldwin (Northern Miner – July 28, 2016)

http://www.northernminer.com/

To order the book, click here: http://www.cobaltboomtown.com/#!shop/vu6uk

The early history of hard rock mining in Ontario is essentially the story of the discovery of silver in Cobalt in 1903. It wasn’t long before the Cobalt mines became the third-largest producer of silver in the world and by the time the boom petered out in the 1920s, the camp had become the fourth-largest silver producer ever discovered.

Today, most Canadians know about the Klondike gold rush in the Yukon, but few realize that the stampede for silver in Cobalt only five years later far surpassed the Klondike in terms of profits, production, and long-term impact.

Spreading out in all directions, prospectors discovered silver in Gowganda and Elk Lake, and gold in Kirkland Lake and Timmins. These discoveries encouraged further exploration in northern Canada and beyond.

Read more

Emerald city: How gemstone-rich Colombia is embracing ethical sourcing – by Nathalie Atkinson (Globe and Mail – July 15, 2016)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

It may be churlish of me to highlight this during wedding season, but as scientist and jeweller Aja Raden points out in her cultural history Stoned, gemstones are “just colourful gravel.” She elaborates on the fraught history and desire around precious objects – pearls, emeralds, wristwatches – with diamonds as one cautionary tale via Marie Antoinette, whose downfall was precipitated by jewellery.

The human history of attraction to bright shiny objects has not exactly been about supply chain integrity or corporate social responsibility – instead, think envy, greed, violence, suffering, slavery, incursions and the guillotine.

To understand the role of gems and jewels in luxury today, it’s necessary to consider, as Raden does, the brilliant “A diamond is forever” campaign that De Beers whipped up in 1947 after the South African diamond rush that saw the company gain control of 99 per cent of the planet’s diamonds.

Read more

Canada’s forgotten silver boomtown – by Douglas Baldwin (CIM Magazine – June/July 2016)

https://www.cim.org/en/

Douglas Baldwin is a retired history professor from Acadia University, Nova Scotia. This piece has been adapted from his new book, Cobalt: Canada’s Forgotten Silver Boom Town.

To order the book, click here: http://www.cobaltboomtown.com/#!shop/vu6uk

Most Canadians know about the Klondike Gold Rush, but few realize that the stampede for silver in Cobalt, Ontario only five years later far surpassed the Klondike in terms of profits, production and long-term impact.

Concentrated in an area less than 13 square kilometres, Cobalt mines supplied almost 90 per cent of Canada’s silver production between 1904 and 1920, and by the time the boom petered out in the 1920s, the camp had become the fourth-largest silver producer ever discovered. The early history of hard rock mining in Ontario is essentially the story of the discovery of silver near Cobalt in 1903.

Read more

Men of the Deeps director wins Helen Creighton Lifetime Achievement Award – by By Hal Higgins (CBC News Nova Scotia – April 19, 2016)

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-scotia/

Jack O’Donnell took group on as a one-time project, still with them 50 years later

As a recipient of the Dr. Helen Creighton Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2016 ECMA gala concert in Sydney last weekend, Jack O’Donnell is reflecting on a connection with the legendary folklorist that began in 1966.

“It was 50 years ago this month,” he said, recalling how Creighton encouraged him when he was a professor in the music department at St. Francis Xavier University to collect coal mining songs from Cape Breton. Moreover, she wanted him to become the director of a singing group composed of miners and former miners.

The singing group was the brainchild of Nina Cohen of Glace Bay. She had proposed the formation of such a chorus, which would showcase Cape Breton’s mining history at Expo ’67 in Montreal during Canada’s centennial year.

Read more

Book details Cobalt’s rise to mining prominence – by Lindsay Kelly (Northern Ontario Business – March 31, 2016)

http://www.northernontariobusiness.com/

A new book about the history of the Town of Cobalt takes an in-depth look at its role in shaping the Canadian mining industry and its underappreciated contributions to the country’s economy.

Cobalt: Canada’s Forgotten Silver Boom Town, written by Prof. Douglas Baldwin, is a 380-page illustrated account that’s been four decades in the making. Baldwin first visited Cobalt in 1975, while researching its history for the Ontario Ministry of Culture and Recreation.

His interest piqued, Baldwin wrote a half-dozen more articles and scholarly journals about Cobalt over the years until 2005, when, on the cusp of retirement from teaching, he responded to an ad seeking someone to research Cobalt’s history. Baldwin’s research continued until he had enough for the book.

Read more

Mining Journal going fortnightly after 181 years – sad news – by Lawrie Williams(Lawrieongold.com – March 29, 2016)

http://lawrieongold.com/

I was saddened to hear that the mining and metals industry’s only truly global weekly business-oriented paper publication, Mining Journal has been relegated to fortnightly, having been a weekly for over 180 years, including maintaining weekly publication through two world wars.

As a former CEO of Mining Journal I feel deeply that this is a retrograde step and is a direct result of a failed attempt to transform a publishing company run by people whose hearts and souls were steeped in the mining industry to what is nowadays in effect a conference company run by professional event organisers and publishers.

The publications are now seemingly primarily a means for promoting the company’s various events. Perhaps this is necessary for a specialist publishing company to stay afloat in this day and age, but its whole ethos has changed as a consequence.

Read more

Excerpt from The Remaking Of The Mining Industry – by David Humphreys

To order a copy of The Remaking Of The Mining Industry, click here: http://www.palgrave.com/gp/book/9781137442000

David Humphreys was formerly chief economist of the London-based mining company, Rio Tinto, and of Russia’s largest mining company, Norkilsk Nickel. Prior to entering the mining industry, he worked in UK government service as an advisor on minerals policy. He has lectured and published widely on the economic of the mining industry.

China Changes Everything: China and the rest of the emerging world

China’s rapid industrialisation in the first decade of the twenty-first century fitted into a broader narrative about how the balance of the global economy was shifting towards emerging market economies.

Strong growth in China and in other emerging economies over many years meant that the historical dominance of the global economy by the advanced Western economies was being eroded. As Figure 2.4 illustrates, through the 1980s and 1990s, global growth was still largely dominated by the advanced economies. In the 2000s, growth rates (based on PPPs) moved higher and growth was dominated by the emerging economies. According to the IMF, the emerging markets’ share of global GDP, which was 37 per cent in 2000, crossed the 50 per cent mark in 2013.

Read more

Keep Cobalt’s History Alive – by Nicole Guertin

Click here for crowdfunding campaign: https://fundrazr.com/campaigns/d143Pd

The Cobalt silver rush was more important than the Klondike gold rush but few people know of its existence. By buying a book, you are helping share the incredible history of Cobalt and raise money for the Historic Cobalt Legacy Fund.

My name is Nicole Guertin and I am the co-owner of the Presidents’ Suites with my partner Jocelyn Blais. The Presidents’ Suites consists of historical homes situated on the shores of beautiful Lake Temiskaming. We are passionate about the region’s unique history and would like everyone to share our passion.

Read more

Edward Burtynsky’s Mesmerizing Images of Copper Mines – by Jon Mooallen (New York Times – October 22, 2015)

http://www.nytimes.com/

Trying to comprehend the scale of open-pit extraction with aerial photographs.

The scale of an open-pit copper mine feels impossible; it is a Bible-grade phenomenon made by machines. Vehicles called bucket-wheel excavators, nearly five times the size of the largest dinosaurs, rip up the surface and gradually descend, piling 200,000 cubic meters or more of rock behind them every day.

Once the copper is extracted, waste products and unrecoverable metals stream out as tailings, snaking tributaries that turn psychedelic-looking as they oxidize in open air for the first time in millions of years. Each excavator, meanwhile, turns the land it is standing on into a ledge and leaves a succession of these steps, or ‘‘benches,’’ behind it as it goes.

The Chino Mine, for example, in Grant County, N.M., has been excavated persistently for more than a century and now stretches almost two miles across and 1,350 feet down. It’s a chasm, a void, a deep and disordered amphitheater built around an abyss. It gets four out of five stars on TripAdvisor.

Read more

BookFilter: Homer Hickam, The Author Whose Story Inspired “October Sky,” Soars Again – by Michael Giltz (Huffington Post – October 14, 2015)

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/

Best-selling author Homer Hickam has enjoyed a varied and acclaimed career, ranging from decorated Vietnam veteran to scuba instructor to working as an aerospace engineer at NASA where he contributed to spacecraft design and crew training. Hickam even had a satisfying creative outlet in a stream of magazine articles capped by an honest-to-goodness military history hit about U-boats attacking the US coast during World War II. Called Torpedo Junction, it was published by the Naval Institute Press (the first home of Tom Clancy), got great reviews and is still in print today.

But all that is dwarfed by the Cinderella story of his first memoir. It began as an article commissioned by the relatively obscure Air & Space/Smithsonian magazine in 1995. Hickam talked about growing up as a kid in coal mining country and how Sputnik inspired he and his friends to start shooting off rockets with gleeful abandon and scientific rigor, scoring a top prize at the national science fair when kids from coal mining towns never even went to science fairs.

Read more

Mining For Gold Song- by Cowboy Junkies

Have a great Labour Day weekend everyone! – Stan Sudol (RepublicOfMining.com)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

The band was formed by three siblings from the Timmins entertainment family.
Another sibling, Cali, rose to fame as an actress on Ryan’s Hope. The Timmins
siblings are descendants of Noah Timmins, a mining prospector who founded
the Ontario [gold mining] city of Timmins. (Wiki)

Cowboy Junkies are a Canadian alternative country/blues/folk rock band. The group was formed in Toronto in 1985 by Margo Timmins (vocalist), Michael Timmins (songwriter, guitarist), Peter Timmins (drummer) and Alan Anton (bassist).[1]

The Junkies first performed publicly at the Beverley Tavern and other clubs in Toronto’s Queen Street West, including The Rivoli. Their 1986 debut album, produced by Canadian producer Peter Moore, was the blues-inspired Whites Off Earth Now!!, recorded using an ambisonic microphone in the family garage.[1]

Read more