Yerington times. [volume] (Yerington, Nev.) 1907-1932, 1908-05-09
A MINING BUREAU
WOULD PROVE
BENEFICIAL

importance to the west, as well as OF
material and financial interest to the Ell
tire country. The west has long needed
a national mining bureau to foster, pro-
mote and develop the mining industries
of the United States, " as the bill intro
duced in congress, which is likely to
pass, puts it. The mining industry is
one of the greatest divisions of national
productive activity. 1t is as important
as any other branch of productive enter
prise, and at last it bids fair to take its
proper place i'll the consideration of the
nation and the national government,
along with farming, manufactures, COM
merce and the like. Heretofore the
mining industry has been left entirely
in the hands of individuals and the gov
eminent has made an exception of it
when dealing with the industries of the
country for the general good Now, at
last, it will be brought within the same
general governmental purview as the
others, and will derive something of the
same benefits.
The national bureau of mines, if put
in charge of a competent commissioner
whose salary, by the way, has been
fixed i'll the bill referred to at $4,000
year-and conducted by him with care
and vigor, should result in unreasonable
good for the entire west and its thous-
ands and thousands of square miles of
mineral territory. The mineralized west
should reap two benefits from the estab-
lishment of the bureau, the benefit that
will result from the encouragement of
legitimate mining and the discourage
ment of fraudulent mining schemes.
This is big field. There is opportunity
bureau of mines.
Everybody who knows the west knows
that it is filled with mining districts,
many of them old discoveries. which
have lacked development because, while
giving every evidence of valuable de-
posits, the task was too much for indi-
vidual enterprise without encourage
ment of any sort and against difficulties
of formidable character In many in
stances the values of old districts have
been known only to poor men, who
lacked the means to call the attention of
capital and convince it that it could reap
profits by the exploitation of such dis
lricts. Part of the duty of the national
mining bureau will be to investigate the
mineral sections of the country, and to
give publicity to its findings in relation
to them A reliable, authentic report
from the bureau of mines upon any min
ing district should have great weight in
the matter of influencing enterprise 1t
should make it possible for poor men to
bring to the attention of the country dis
tricts which they are convinced contain
mineral wealth.
Mining regions remote from railroads,
mills, wood, water and the supplies nee
essary to successful mining will be large
ly helped by the new bureau. Their
mineral resources will be ascertained
with degree of scientific certainty and
toward inducing capital to take longer
chances than it does i'll dealing with the
unknown mining district under ordinary
circumstances. This work of the bureau
and its other activities should bring the
whole mineral area of the country more
prominently before the people, and thus
should place the mining industry upon a
more substantial and staple basis than it
has ever occupied.
There is no overestimating the good
which the national mining bureau will
be able to do the mining industry If 1t
succeeds in eliminating mining enter
prises of fraudulent character entirely
from the field This alone will be big
task. A mining enterprise, like rail-
road, is capable of much uncertainty,
without being absolutely meretricious,
that it forms difficult subject for analy-
sis and classification. But still, the min
ing bureau will be able to do much good
in all cases of mining schemes of uncer-
tain character by compelling such show
of good faith, and such publicity as to
capital, resources and possibilities as to
greatly enlighten the public for its own
protection, and to fix the nature of the
enterprise.
The sooner the national mining bu-
reau is established and in operation the
better for the mining States and their
enterprises. Goldfield Review.