Mohave County miner and our mineral wealth., 1922-01-06
Causes of Failure in Field of Mining
 Receive Analysis
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 known to exist in the mine. If oper- ations had continued very much fur ther on the plan followed by the mine manager, the result would have been bankruptcy for the enterprise, yet the fault would not have been with the mine nor with the undertaking, but wholly with incompetent direction and supervision.
 Business Methods Vital
 To the men who hesitate to under take mining operations because they themselves are untrained in geology and the allied sciences necessary in mining, it may be pointed out that many men own farms who do not un- derstand the chemistry of soils or the thousand and one details involved in planting, harvesting or cattle breed ing, many others own vast forests and entrust their numbering opera tions to the technical men on their own staff. The same condition ap- plies in mining operations. But, cur iously enough, it seems as though when a mining project is begun and the capital has been provided for the operations, then the non-technical di- rector immediately throws up his hands helplessly and ignores common business methods with the plea that he "doesn't know anything about mining" As if mining were re- condite and esoteric business in which all rules of ordinarily business pro- cedure were suspended!
 of you haven't the required techni- cal knowledge, buy it," is the maxim of successful and widely-knorn eX- ecutive. Men of affairs should know that the first logical step toward sue cessful operations at the mine is the management of trained mine opera tor fortheir mine manager. This does not mean that they should employ the first man who comes along who says he is an experienced miner; nor does it mean that all the mining wisdom of the ages is to be found in the prac- tical miner. But it does mean that the same care and attention should be given to this detail that these same men would give to the selection of their doctor or attorney, or to their cashier(, their manager of real estate, drX-goods or whatever business. Un- happily this is not often done, and in this failure to select well-qualified administrative officer the foundation is often laid for failure of the entire business.
 Glib Talker Gets Job
 Within the month I was told of a placer mining operation which showed excellent results, so far as the amount of gold produced was concerned, but the directors hired as their manager a man who happened to be travelling through their home town, and said he was mining engineer. He talked glibly, seemed to indicate good knowledge of the business and, alto gether, he impressed the directors as a suitable man. They did not inves- tigate what references he may have given. As matter of fact, none was asked of him. And he was hired as manager.
 Now in placer mining, the gold is recovered, as the "pure quill," as the miners say, and it is easy for dis honest man ta take what gold he wants from the amount recovered at the clean-ups. Precisely this thing occurred
 For two years the manager had a larger income from the clean-ups than he did from the salary, and no check was ever made on him. He was given no period of vacation from the mine so that the recoveries might be checked in his absence. He spent funds lav- ishly for equipment, so that his own peculations might be concealed in mass of large expenditures, and alto gether the directors were defrauded.
 Disclosure only came because this happened to be a close corporation, and one investor in the east had sub scribed $10,000. When he received no returns after two years of operation he started an investigation that un- covered the true status. For this it is no doubt that mining was blamed as the cause of the loss, when in truth it was rank carelessness in ordinary business judgment.
 A similar beginning, with a hap pier ending, came to my personal knowledge few years ago. A miner of Colorado-a practical miner" (about this title a haze of romance seems to hang!)-went to Chicago to place mining proposition before capital. Not many Chicagoans are so placed that they are acquainted with first-class mining engineers, be- cause Chicago capital is not largely invested in mining.
 Inefficiency Costly In this instance, the men approach led sent out as their representative to pass on the mine superannuated mining engineer. He was an acquain- 'tance of one of the group, but he was