Gold, Gold

James Y. Murdoch, 40, King's Counsel, a man of great esteem in Toronto, last fortnight reported to the shareholders of Noranda Mines, Ltd. of which he is president. From Noranda's deep shafts which pierce rich veins of gold, and from its bigger copper deposits, from its smelters and refineries, last year Noranda earned only $3,842,000 against $4,287,000 in 1929. But this news was not discouraging to Noranda's shareholders, all of whom have had faith that the spectacular history of Noranda cannot continue dull for long. For a few days after President Murdoch's report the stock remained steady on the New York Curb and Toronto Stock Exchange at $17. Then suddenly, as if in answer to the shareholders' faith, it bubbled with activity, soared to $27 on the news that once again Noranda had struck a new gold vein, that ore yielding as high as $16.20 to the ton had been located.* Within one week more than $22,000,000 new market value had bloomed on Noranda 's 2,200,000 shares.

At a propitious time comes Noranda's new gold discovery. Low commodity prices, cheaper Labor, have in effect in creased the price of gold, always salable to Government mints at $20.67183462 per fine ounce. Thus gold mines which a few years ago were just able to break even are now operating at a profit, ones which were just profitable are now turning in tremendous profits. The effect of this has been that Gold Fever, always smoldering in the mind of man, has flamed fiercer than ever. One evidence of this is seen on the stock exchanges. Alaska Juneau (the big Treadwell Mine), Dome Mines (of which Broker Jules Semon Bache is president), Mclntyre-Porcupine, Homestake, Tech-Hughes, are all selling near or above their 1930 highs. Another evidence of the fever is seen wherever there is a chance of gold being found. Globe, Ariz, bubbled with excitement last week on the report that the so-called "Lost Dutchman" mine in Superstition Mountain had been found again after 20 years. Several weeks ago more than 500 men, many jobless, were stampeded by a rumor of gold from Calgary to the bleak, cold Livingstone River Valley 100 miles away. Australia still teems with excitement over a 94-lb. nugget found two months ago. Gold-rich Africa is the scene of similar tension. And last week in San Ignacio, Mexico, one Guillermo Laveaga came out of the hills and caused a gold-rush by his tales of a place where gold is to be extracted from the rocks with hunting knives.

Gold prospectors are men of faith and hope, dauntless. Typical of their kind is Edmund H. Home who discovered the rocks upon which Noranda was built.

The long odyssey of Miner Home is unusual because it has a perfect ending. On the shores of Grand Lake, Nova Scotia, near the town of Enfield where he was born 66 years ago, he has retired on his winnings, built for himself a big dwelling in the seclusion of the pines.

Ed Home started work in the mines of Nova Scotia when he was young. In 1898 he went to British Columbia and worked in the mills of the Slocan Star and the Athabaska, then got a good position in a mill at Ymir. But he had "miner's foot." He went to California. In 1907 he went to Labrador. For a while he ran the King Edward Mill at Cobalt, Ontario, then was off to the Porcupine District, then the Kirkland Lake District. In 1911 he went to the Rouyn District of Quebec and found some gold. Nine years later he staked the claims, financed by a syndicate of farmers. Experts refused to buy him out but in 1922 two New York men, Humphrey W. Chadbourne (brother of Sugarman Thomas Lincoln Chadbourne) and Samuel C. Thomson, mining engineers, prospecting in the district, formed the Noranda syndicate to take over what Ed Home had found.

In 1923 a diamond drill 131 feet deep at Noranda startled the mining world by striking copper as well as gold. A town arose and the great Noranda mines were under way. In 1925 the 20,000 Noranda $100-par shares were split 100-for-one. At last week's price of $27 the old shares would be worth $2,700. At last year's high of $44 a share, Noranda's valuation was $96,000,000 against the original $2,000,000.

*Gold yields of $6 to the ton are considered the lowest which are profitable in eastern Canada.

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