The Alaska daily empire., 1919-12-10
VERY RICH GOLD STRIKES MADE
 ON kUSKOKW|M
Tom Aitken and Others Get $2,M0 Ore in Large Quantities in New
 District PLACER IS ALSO GOOD

Telegrams received by Gov. Thomas Riggs Jr. bring from Me. Grath on the upper Kuskokwim river the story of great discoveries of very rich gold quartz on Nixon Fork. The quartz runs as high as $2,000 a ton, and big tonnage is said to be in sight for distance of more than a mile and 8 quarter. It is said that mil lions of dollars worth of this ore will be shipped to the outside with the opening of navigation next June. Work will progress all winter. Among those in on the Kuskokwim quartz discoveries are leading mining men of the Alaskan interior, including Ait ken, Walsh, Whalen, Pearson, Mes pak, Kirkpatrick and others.
 The telegrams from McGrath also convey the news that the Aitken dredge on Candle creek, also tribu- tary of the Kuskokwim. produced oyer $30O.00O in placer gold last sea- son, working at only half capacity. It is expected that 1t will take out a half milton next year The. .dredge worked until late in the season.
 Telegram to Gov Riggs
 Gov. Riggs has just received the following telegram from Dr. W. F. Green. United States Commissioner at McGrath:.
 "rhe Candle creek dredge produced $300,000. working at half capacity. :. 'tAitken on Nixon Fork is down 65 feet with crosscut 25 feet The gold is increasing with depth. It is now running $2,00O to the ton. They will ship 1000 tons of high grade ore next June. Steam hoists and com pressors will be working December Is.
 "Whalen. one mile southwest from Aiken, will ship 200 tons of the same ore.
 Pearson, between the two, has the same ore for the length of a fuli claim and half.
 "Mespelt, located northeast of Ait ken. is down 45 feet.
 ''Big tonnage is in sight now for q distance of mile and a quarter"
 The men who are developing the Kuslpokwim placer and quartz fields are not eboomers." They are all old time miners who have been success full in the Iditarod. Fairbanks and other uorthern goldields, and they ara operating with their own money. They have been quietly but persist. ently developing the region, which is just across the divide from the Idit- arod and northeast of that district, for several years, spending many thousends annually of the output of their producing properties in the Idit. arod In the work. Aiken and Walsh are among the richest men made by the IditaroA goldfelds. Al Walsh has been the leading individual oper- ator on Flat creek for years where fe employs from 50 to 75 men on his placer property. Tom Aitker with whom he is associated in the Kus- kokwim country, made a fortune on Cleary creek, Fairbanks district. in association with Frank Manley. Hen " Riley and others before he went to Idatarod, where he secured very rich properties and sold them to the faakon Gold Corporation. usually re- ferred to as "the Guggenheims."
 Those who have been following the operations of these practical men believe, 1n the light of the word re- cetyed from McGrath by Gov. Riggs, that one of the richest of Alaska's gold .districts will be developed in the region about McGrath on the Kus- kolIwim.
 Tom Aitken. Tom Kirkpatrick ana otbers who are interested in the kds- koawim country. have also made very promising quartz discoveries near the hesdvaters of the Kantishna' which is across the divide from the Kuskokwim developments. They took . large Quantity of supplies into the Kantishna district from Fairbanks late in the season. carrying them as near fAeir properties as river steam CTS could take them. They will be hsuled from the terminus to their propsrtbs during the wintor.