Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1910-01-22

man was a trespasser. The land was
all reserved from settlement and oc-
cupation, but the colonial land depart
ment had no wish to engage in whole
sale prosecutions, and allowed mat
tiers to drift until late in 1887, when a
proclamation was issued canceling the
reserve. Then came a free-for-au fight
for land. No one had any shadow of
a legal title, and every claim of any
possible value was holly contested by
a dozen or more disputants. Claim
jumping. rioting, assassination and
gun fighting for a time made Broken
Hill one of the widest and most law
less of the worlds mining camps
AS soon as the Battle of the Bar
rier,'' as this reriod of strife was
called, had been fought to finish, the
great mining booms-like the "Kaffir
circus" of South Africa or the more
recent Goldfield and Cobalt frenzies.
Promoters traded upon the peoples
credulity rather than upon the earth's
riches, and the amount of credulity
available passed human powers of es-
tfmation. 1t was all converted into
cash by the crafty. Everything with
in a radius of miles was ''pegged.'' and
shares in worthless saltbush claims
were sold at figures that would have
been extravagant for dividend payers
in old and well-established mining dis
tricts.
One man wanted to be in the gam
BILE badly, but he didn't have a one
pound note to his name. So he wired
Melbourne broker to buy for his
account 1000 shares in Block Number
Ten in which it was expected that
the lode would be cut at any moment.
The broker had unlimited faith in any
thing bearing the Broken Hill label,
so he executed the order, believing
that 1t came from a man with plenty
of money as well as sound judgment,
and allotted to him a thousand shares
at the market. which was then three
pounds six shillings. In less than a
week the lode was cut, proving to be
of phenomenal richness. and shares
scared to EGO each. The man with
plenty of nerve. although with only
enough cash to pay for a telegram.
cleared G15,000 on the deal.
Grows Into Wealthy City.
In 25 years the little $35-a-week
syndicate has developed into the
worlds greatest silver-lead corpora
ton. employing 5000 men at its mines
works at Port Prairie; and the mu-
nicipality Matched from a dozen stale
eggs has grown to be the wealthiest
city of New South Wales, the creator
of a hundred colossal fortunes. Ten
years ago even expert mining men
regarded the camp as rapidly ap
preaching the has been" class, be
cause the carbonates and -oxidized
ores that had been the making of the
mines seemed to be verging rapidly
| toward exhaustion. Then it was
| found that on down below the carbon
ates were sulphides extending indefi
nitely into the bowels of the earth;
/ and that the .'ironstone" outcrop that
SCARED the face of the whole sur
rounding country was rich in lead
silver and zinc. To extract the silver
alone from the ironstone did not pay
but to smelt the ores for the saving
of the silver, lead and zinc values was
! like rubbing the lamp of Aladdin.
As result of the discovery of sui
phides-and of practical and eco
nomical way of treating them-a rail
road was built connecting Broken Hill
with the ocean at Port Prairie, where
one OF the largest silver-lead reduction
works in the world has been built
Pig lead is shipped to Europe literally
by the shipload, and silver bullion By
/ the tom Most of the zinc ores are
concentrated and the concentrate:
| shipped to Europe for treatment; bu
! 1t is probable that before long these
also will be reduced at Port Prize
Small quantities of gold, copper ant
tin are produced, and great expecta