The county record. [volume] (Kingstree, S.C.) 1885-1975, 1898-05-05
GOLD MINING.
Luck Less q Factor Than Pluck, Energy
End Observation.

End ODSerTstion.
The newspaper sCrlbbler, IN want
of fresh copy, has habit of telling
tales of blind luck and happy acci-
dent. A drunken fool falls down on
the hillside and wakes from his tUr-
bid dreams to Snd himself resting
against a ledge of white quartz
cleaning with the yellow metal, or
an idle shepherd picks up stone to
throw at stray sheep, and, rcallz-
ing its unusual weight, skaters 1t
against a bowlder to find it the open
sesame to the caverns of Aladdin.
Don't believe it, The blind god
dess Fortune directs the miners
destiny less frequently than the
brotherhood of pluck, energy and
observation. There is as much luck
in mining as in all things human,
but hardly more; there is as much
room for intelligent design and care
full foresight rs in any other busl.
Less and probably more.
Illustrations borrowed from fact
will be of service. When Thomas
kruse, at Marysville, Mon, was
opening up the mine which made
him millionaire, there came a story
of an old man driving tunnel into
mountain at a place where he
would find macadam for the road,
but no ore for the mill. When the
crosscut intercepted wide vein Of
rich stuff, men pointed to the Incl
dent as another evidence of the hit
or miss character of ordinary min
ing. The real facts were far other
wise.
"Old Tommy Kruse," as he is
known all over Montana, was vcsy
shrewd and sensible prospector. He
had found the outcrop of promis-
ing lode on the mountain side and
had realized that, while one man
alone cannot sink shaft 100 feet
deep, he CAN, with his own unaided
energy, drive a tunnel for several
hundred feet. The tunnel cut the
vein, whose position he had pre-
viously determined. So was begun
the exploitation of q mine which
has tecome famous in mining an
nails as the Drumlummon. 1t now
has about 12 miles of workings, out
of which has come ore of value
approximating $14,O00,000.
The Enterprise mine at Rico, III
Colorado, was discovered by David
Swickhimer. Picturesque stories are
told of the timely ala of lottery
winning and of the haphazard pene-
tration into big Ole body. The
truth is quite as romantic. Never
were correct reasoning and indomi-
table pluck more fittingly rewarded.
SwiChhimer had been working for
wages in the ground of the Swansea
Mining company, Oh Newman hill.
He had learned the course of the
veins which were being there sue.
cessfully worked, and this knowl-
edge was particularly valuable be-
cause the true rock-sanGstone and
limestone-is, in that locality, over
laid by several hundred feet of
powders and gravel of lacustrine
origin. The veins do not reach the
surface of today, and hence have no
cropping to indicate their position.
SwIckhimer left the Swansea mine
and located a claim, the Enterprise,
to the north. He began the sinking
of a shaft only to find that the por-
business of powders caused flow
of water which hindered progress
and made the work very expensive.
A pump was at length purchased
and it replaced the bucket and wind
lass.
But in the meantime the Swansea
company was pushing its levels
ahead and would soon penetrate into
Swickhimer' claim. Unless he
found ore in place his location
would, by the terms of the absurd
American mining law, be invalid
The sinking of the shaft was hur-
ried with a tireless energy which
surmounted all sorts of bad luck.
Eventually ore was struck, and the
plucky adventurer won his fortune
Since then the Enterprise mine has
produced SO, 500, 600 out of its eight
miles of underground workings
r. A. Rickard in Cassier = Magazine.
Nor Hog Thieves.
A good many years before the