Bisbee daily review., 1918-05-12
NOLYDDENUN FIND OLD DOMINION IN OF ARIZONA MANPAST YEAR SHOWS ROMANTIC STORY INCREASED COSTS
Prospector, R. O. Boykin, Hits Better Than Gold Ore; Capture of Busy Bertha Re- veals Krupp Secret
CHarold Blake Schumm in the Phila-
 delphia Public Ledger)

(Harold Blake Schumm in the Phila-
 delphia Public Ledger)
 In December, 1913, a lone prospector was wandering over Southern Arizona on an optimistic search for gold. Robert O. EOykin was his name, and mail addressed Tucson, Arizona, would reach him some time. He was a tall. sturdy young frontiersman. born fewer than thirty years before in Texas of old Texan stock. In his youth he was a COW puncher, then a broncho buster. later Texas Ranger, a miner, a deputy sheriff in a mining community. a rodman on a geological survey, and then, spurred on by the call of gold" a prospector in the out of-the-way corners of civilization.
 He was. tracking through a deserted town-a ghost town of Arizona, called Mammoth-a place that years ago, when the mine was running, was worthy of the name it bore. On his burro the prOspeotOr had packed his canvas bedding and cooking utensils, and in the rain had started on his way to a Mexican adobe hut that of fered a lodging On the long way through the cactus and mesquite the burro and the prospector had wearily plodded along.
 As he approached the deserted town the rain was falling. The burro would not increase its pace. Using a switch he had cut from mesquite tree, Bod kin whipped the animal, and the bur TO gave such a kick that a frying pan Sr1a o1o fO hn ground.
 Boykin stopped to pick it up and as he did so he noticed yellow streaks in the beds of the rivulets running down the side of the road into the i San Pedro River.
 A Strange Yellow Metal
 Here was something new. What was it?
 With the eye of a connoisseur Boy kin started to investigate The rain was now pouring down, but oblivious of the fact he kept on. Like a trained surgeon performing an operation un- der she'll fire. he wandered all around wondering what these deposits could be. He traced the yellow streak" to the tailings of the obsolete and de- !! serted mine, and then dumping the tobacco out of his tin into his pocket 1 he filled the can with the unknown and went to his bed in the Mexican ] hut to dreams worthy of fiction.
 Boylin took the tin can to Tucson, ] where in the laboratories of the Uni | versity of Arizona the tests were | made. "Wulfenite" it's chief constit- | uents being "molybdenum" and lead was found in abundance.
 But what good was ''molybdenum?" | For what could it be used. IL surely | did not-experts thOught-amount to l much, for in the entire United States | in 1913 there were but thirteen tons | of such ore
 At this point the scene shifts to Germany
 While the world was peaceably go- | ing about its affairs, the kaiser's gen. 1 eral staff, through its underground | agents, heard of this discovery in far | away Arizona. Boykin was told to | send sample to a firm in Hamburg representatives of the Krupp Gun | Works. Came cable right back to | Boykin:
 How much have you, and when can we get it? Cable reply immedi- ately"
 Boykin. lacking finances, took the proposition up with a capitalist of Tucson, and through him was able to get a plant started. The price the | Germans offered Boykin was, to his mind, staggering. Fortune, he thought, was his.
 Contract Void By War
 But just as the first delivery was to be sent to Hamburg the war broke full force upon the world Boykin looked at his contract, and for the first time realized that the harmless as he had thousht-clause void in case of war" left him with it on his hands. Financial ruin stared him in the face. He had the plant and the product on his hands, and shipments to Germany were impossible.
 Then came Liege, Antwerp, and fi- nally the Marne, with it's capture of "Rusy Bertha" and the discovery of { the use of "mOlybdenum" in the man. ufacture of the great German guns.
 Immediately the English subsidized | the molybdenum mining industry in Canada and Australia, and then the | entire products of Boykin's plant at | Mammoth were taken by the British l. and French. Today the United StgIes l. has first call on the output.
 It is today no military secret the | importance this metal is to play in the l war One has only to view the town | of Mammoth, and compare it with | four years ago. Then it was deserted, | lonely and ghostlike. 8 few people l
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