The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1903-06-27
AFFAIR TO
BUY MACHINERY
Junsuke Iijima Represents Larg-
est Copper Mines in Japan.
WERE WORKED 800 YEARS AGO
OWNER HAS RELATIVES IN THE
LEGATION AT WASHINGTON.

Junsuke Hjima. a representative OF
the wealthiest mine owner Of Japan,
is registered at the Knutsford and Is
making his first trip to this country
for the purpose of buying improved
machinery. The property which Mr..
Iijima represents includes the famous
AshiO copper mines, owned by jun
k1che Furnkawa, second son Of Count
Mutsu, late minister of foreign affairs
IN Japan. and younger brother OF
Count Mutsu, a secretary Of the lega-
ton of Japan in Washington.
Mr. Iijima said: THE mines arr
among the oldest in the world, being
worked 300 years ago. They are four
teen in number and produce 2O,OOO,U00
pounds Of refined copper annually The
largest producers are the BeSsl, WIN
an output Of 100000 pounds Of ore,
and the Kosaka. with an output OF
L 600 600 pounds The other mines
have an output of from 100000 to
5000 900 pounds Of copper ore. the
Ashio are the largest copper mines IN
Japan and are located in Shimstsuke
province in the northern part Of Japan
and about 100 miles distant from Toxic
and $50 from Yokohama. Most of tn
copper mines are in the northern, cen
trail. western and southwestern part or
the country"
Studies American Methods.
Mr. Iijima. who is known in his
country as a kOgakushi doctor Of en-
gineering). has been in America sew
eral weeks for the purpose Of studying
the mines of this country and to IA
miliaTiZe himself with American meJh-
DDS. He was educated in Toxic, where
he studied with an American profess
sor. He speaks excellent English Ac-
cents bother him. but he has no trouble
to understand when a person speaks
slowly and prOnOunces his words care
fully. He writes an excellent hano'
and, in fact, can read and write Eng
lish better than he speaks, because
then he is not troubled with accents.
MY purpose here, of course, is TO
buy machinery for the mines which
represent" he explained. Before
leave the country expect to place or
ders for three blast furnaces. two con-
verters. one blowing machine, one
fifty-ton travelling crane and auxiliary
arparatu In my travels TO inspect
mines and machinery I have been 10
Seattle. San Francisco. Arizona, Ola
Mexico, Colorado. Omaha, chicago,
Pittsburg, Washington. Baltimore,
New York. Montana and here. While
in the east Z also stopped off at Nj
agara Falls I expect to leave mere
tomorrow for San Francisco and will
put in several weeks there
Government Owns Iron Mines
since the war Japan has been very
prosperous and business has been
forging ahead. The mines of the
country are owned by private individ-
uals. the government owning only the
iron mines The mines I represent en-
plOy about 5000 men, but we want to
increase our output and this we cannot
do with our present methods I am
deeply impressed with the manner in
which not only mining. but everything
else, is conducted in this country.
Everything is done on such colossal
scale"
Mr.. Iijima is rather a laTse man,
under the medium height and well in
formed on the political affairs Of this
and his own country He has large
intelligent eyes and a pleasing ad-
dress.