The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-06-13
Great Fortunes Built on Small
Investment of Money.
BUSINESS OF GRUBsTAKINe.
The Law and It's Operation in Cali
fornia and the Southwest-Hand-
some Returns in on the Outlay.

There have been several knotly cases III
the state courts, writes a correspondent
Of the New York Sun. to determine how
Tar 2 grubstake goes, and what a grub
stake is, where there is no contract or
stipulation, verbal or otherwise. between
the mining prospector and his grub
stalker. One of the cases is that of George
Abrams OF Los Angeles against the
Berigo Mining company of san Ber-
nardino county. Mr.. Abrams claims that
he boarded and fed prospector, henry
NJ Biggs, who found and located the
Berigo mine, and that the board was
considered grubstake. The mining COM
pany ard Biggs claim that the board was
paid for by stable work by the prospector
several months after il was provided Mr.
Abrams claims a one-third interest in
the Berigo mine and he has won his case
in the superior court. One-third of the
Bertgo mine is said to be worth at least
S150.000. Naturally the mining company IS
defending the suit vigorously, and has
employed some very able lawyers VINO
ridicule the plaintiffs claims under the
grubstake law.
in all the mining regions of the west
there are men constantly investing IN
pectors. Hundreds Of bankers. profes-
ssiocal men and merchants all over the
west have for years laid aside al PERIODS
a certain sum of money from their earn
ings to provide for the grubstakes OF
men who have given assurances that pay
ore may be found in d certain canyon or
mountain range. 1t is not uncommon TO
see IN the local newspapers OF California
and the territories g paid item to the
effect that so and So grubstakes re-
liable and competent mining prospeetors
WHAT A GRUBSTAKB MEANS.
A grubstake nowadays commonly means
food. p few mining tools and lot of
dynamite sticks or candles for blasting IN
rocks where precious metal is suspected.
The average mining prospector is a hard
up, visionary, good-natured. philosophic
soul, who has endured much and pursued
long in his following of the reckonlngS OF
fortune over burning desert wastes.
among desolate crags and peaks and
through desolate canyons and gulches.
He has been dead sure scores of times
that he has found rock that was going TO
be his fortune stroke, and has been dis
appointed each time. He is just GER
tain ever that he is at last looking in
the right field for the right sort of rock.
a little more grubstaking, and he will
soon find 2 ledge of gold ore that will
make him and his friend rich beyond the
dreams of avarice. His food consists of a
bushel or so of beans, a chunk of salt
pork. jcrked beef, crackers, sugar and
coffee He can shoot game almost any
where in the mining region, and he there
fore wants gunpowder and shot The eX-
pense of a grubstake is from SO to $l3
month. If the prOspector makes his grub
stalking partner believe that the chances
of finding a golden ledge are uncommonly
bright, and that the dangers of finding
and locating the mining are considerable.
there may be an extra grubstake as a
pack donkey or two, and the promise or
several hundred or thousand dollars down
a bonus when the mine is found and
assayed. Sometimes two prospectors may
work over a range of mountains together
. season, both being grubstaked by a
man at home. In case a mine is located.
the grubstaker and the DrosDectors have
each 4 third of the property Not one
Erubstake agreement in a hundred is
written. The common law of the western
mining regions is so strong. and there IS
a certain sense of honor among profess
sional prospectors and mining men re-
garding the contract for grubstakes, that
IL is a disCourteous suspicion to suggest
that the terms be put on paper. The late
General Fuller of Los Angeles. who was
in mining and grubstaking for 10 years.
said that he never knew of more than half
Il dozen written grubstake agreements.
THE GRUBsTAKERS.
The principal men who grubstake pros
pectors have themselves been mining pros
pectors and know al a glance live rock
from dead. and have ideas of their own
TO where pros1ectors may have some
chance at finding hidden wealth. Richard
Grid. who made a fortune of S2O00.O00 IN
the Tombstone mines in southern Arizona.
and has been the soul of the great beet
sugar industry at Chino. Cal, recently
told the writer that he had spent from
5000 to $1,000 year for long time in
grubstaking men in the Sierras and
Rockies and IN lower California. He con-
sidered il the best kind of investment. He
got a third interest in silver mine in
chihuahua. Mexico. from a grubStake in
1854 and sold il for SIS. 600. He is in Mexico
II this writing looking over copper
mine that 4 prospeCtor whom he had been
grubstaking during several years. finally
located. Ii IS believed that Mr.. Grid viii
get something like $4,000 out of that prop
crty. That viii pay handsomely for many
years of most expensive grubstaking. The
late United States Senator George
Hearst. of California. made the search
for new mines more of Il wholesale bust
than else. He made all his
fortune OF so. 0000 600 in gold and silver
mines In the last ten years of his life
he kept as many so men prospecting
IL the Sierras and Rockies all the way
from Vancouver. i. {. to Sonora. Mex.
He had an accountant in San Francisco,
who was employed to keep Il record of
the gruhstake moneys and outfits sent
to the prospectors here and there on the
coast. He required statements TO be made
TO him BY each prospector at stated
periods concerning the work that was
being done and what might be found in
his particular field. The senator employed
men TO 30 and look into the prospects
and assay the rock when a report came
to the San Francisco office that favorable
lodges had been discovered. When
particularly good report came he Oc
ctsionallv went himself to see what the
prospector had uncovered. Some of his
more trustworthy and industrious pros
pectu-s worked on salary and grubstake
stakeo. In this way the senator came TO
have interests in a half-dozen first-class
gold mines in Oregon and Arizona. and
share in % other less successful mines.
CAN'T BE FOOLED.
It is easy TO see how a mining pros
pector may deceive his grubstaker. While
the latter may be at his business or home
in the city the prospector may be en-
joyinG the summer camping along some
mountain stream where there Is good
fishing and plenty of good game to
hunt. But such prospectors do not
deceive a ssgacious grubstaker long.
for the eruDstaker has been Il prOSpector
himself sometimes and he knows from
the specimens OF rock that the prospector
brings 10 him at the close of the grub
, stalking period how much ground he has
searched over, and has some idea how
his time.
Arizona courts Il suit involving some $780,
O0O IN the Gleason mine. because of a
prospector. Harry Edwards. and Edmund
e. Randolph. OF the Southern Pacific
Railroad company. The case shows how
near = man can come to share in 4
fortune and then lose It. Edwards last
summer told Randolph that he knew
where there was good prospects near
Tacna station. across the blistering
desert that surrounds Yuma. IN Arizona.
Tzonths at 81 a month. When Edwards
came back empty handed. Randolph de-
clined 70 pay another dollar or mere
opinions Then a locomotive engineer,
II. S. Gleason. put faith in Edward
stories. and sent him out with another
grubstake. In December Edwards found
the pay rock. and il has proved the very
richest find in Arizona since the HarQua
Haia mines We're discovered in 1890 The
mine IS known as the Gleason. and one
can hardly pick up an Arizona or south
ern California newspaper today without
reading something about ii. Ex-United