The Alaska citizen., 1916-05-08
Phone 262 Phone
JUST SCRATCHED.

Although placer mining has been going on iu this district |or the rast twelve or fourteen years the tiId recently made by Quirk X Gideon on No. II below on Dome creek k proof conclusive that eFen fhe deep placer diggugs here have been mercy scratched over as il were For it is a well known fact tIat miles and miles of ground Io- Ca'ed on what are known to b. socalled pay creeks" yet remains to be prospected. That k. the pres pectinS done so far has failed to dis close the existence of pay on the ground. although instances are rare when gold vaS not found at the bottom of tho shafts put 10 bedrocs. indieaJiag that if the precious loetal can be found where it has been concentrated after the erosion of yeaIs a2o. the ground can be made 10 paH to work
 The discovery recently made by the Dome creek miners is the best demonstration Of the above state meut For while old Dome in her time produced her millions. pros pecting by all known methods failed to show the existence of pay gravel on about two miles of her lower reaches until this spring And fai.- Hre to find the pay there has always been a mystery 10 the old time mining men oe the district for tho reason that the remainder of the creek showed such excellent pay since gold was first discovered in pay ing quantities on the stream. And it was only natural to suppose after all of the prospecting had been done, that Dome creek con, tained blank in her paystreak
 Therefore when Tommy Quir1 started to prospect on No II be low a great many people were very skcptical as to the results he would get In fact nearly everybody thought that he would be doing all of his work for nothing and he had a hard time finding a partner to go on with the work with him. Man after man to whom he put the proposition turned it down for the reason that they considered that there was not the slightest chance of finding pay
 But Quirk persisted for the req son that he had nothing else to do He is the proprietor of a little lOdg ing house at Olnes, but his wife could easily handle that, leaving him plenty of time for prospecting Therefore he concluded to give low CT Dome one more try, for the hole in which he found the pay is not the first by many he has sunk in that vicinity, as he is part owner of No F below.
 Last fall Grover Gideon and his wife moved out to Olues She went to work at John L. Whites store, while he took job driving a freight stage for Paul Ringseth be tween Olnes and the Tolovana coun- try. Then came the slump in the passenger traffic to the Tolovana, as far as the stage line was con cerned The result was that Gideon, the newcomer was discharged from the employ of the stage line, in or der that the old driver of the pas senger stage might take the freight rig.
 And that discharge was the best thing that ever happened to Glide on For. desperate for something to do in order to keep from loafing his time away, and willing to take a chance on almost anything which presented itself, he went in with Tommy Quirk Of course he re ceived all kinds of discouraging ad vice from friends he had made at Olnes, but that fact did not deter him from working. on account of the fact that he thought he might as well be sinking shafts as loaf ing, which latter occupation, if such it can be called, was staring him in the face.
 Now, of course, Quirk X Gideon are in big money. That is, they have probable fortunes in sight as the result of their winters prospect ing For since they first found pay at the bottom of their shaft they have been running tunnels and sluicing up the dirt as it is hoisted. The result is that they have 40 feet of a crosscut. showing that the paystreak is at least that wide. and have sluiced up nearly thousand dollars.
 What Quirk & Gideon have done during the past four or five months can be done by others. For there are undoubtedly miles and miles of ground. possibly not so rich, but