The Press., 1922-08-24
FOR BIG "STRIKE''
Aged Mining PtOspeCtOr Fakes
 One More Chance.
Sam COnger, Eighty-Nine Years Old, Still in the Harness and Confident
 He Will Win.

Recently news came that the oldest active mining prOspectOr in the world, Sam OOnger, eighty-nine years old. was going back to the Rockies, deter mined to make his last big strike.
 Sam COnger," the story said lis the Grand Old Man of the Mountains -he has prospected in the Rockies for more than seventy years. Ill addition to lOca ting many of the best paying gold and silver mines in the state, he Uncovered tungsten, the rare metal of Colorado. He is known to every old mining man and, despite his eighty nine years, Sam OOnger, game to the backbone, is going to the mountains. laden with pack, pick, pan and shovel, resolute in the faith that he will make one more big strike"
 It was in Boulder county that he made his first big strike with his dis cOvery of the Buckeye lead in 1862, while the battle of Antietam was be- ing fought. Since then he prOspected in California, Oregon, New Mexico, Arizona. and studied leads and veins and strata in every mining section of Colorado. But 1t was always to BOu!- der county that he returned to make the big strike. One time it was the Caribou mine, later sold to capitalists of Holland. Then, after long pros pecting in other sections, he came back to Boulder and discovered the Poor Man mine, where the ore ran S10,OOO to the ton. There were the Fourth of July and the Diantha and many others.
 Near Boulder City in the middle mineral Sam COnger did not then Know that he had discovered tungsten. In Oregon he learned the great value of the mineral. He hurried back 10 Colorado and, in the streets of Den yer, met his old partner, who in Ari- Eona had also learned that the black ore was tungsten.
 Sam COnger's tungsten claim was offered to the Allis company of Mill waukee and turned down. "There is not a great demand for tungsten" an official said land if 1t should be found in such quantities as COnger says, the price will fall to the lowest point" Conger's option expired. Then An drew Carnegie took over the tungsten claims. Each year since they have produced their millions.
 COnger was born in Ohio. AS lad of seventeen he heard that the lead mines of southwestern Wisconsin were the places for big stakes, but in Wisconsin all the talk was of the rich ness of the lead deposits of Missouri. And in Missouri he heard of the re- gently discovered gold at the junction of Cherry creek and the Platte river, out where the Ute Indians lived, across the Great American desert.
 Sam COnger was one of party to drive across the Great Plains with "Pike's Peak or Bust on the wagon canvas and then began his 70 years of prospecting for the precious metals.
 Later Sam COnger went to New Mexico. He read how mutiny smOul- dered among the Indians, how they arose, murdered both Spanish con QuerOrs and FranciScanS and filled up the mines.
 Sam found one of these mines-the St. Lazarus. And until the body of gold ore was worked out it was a good producing mine.
 Sam has always wanted riches-nOt thousands, but millions. Then he could fix everybody up," and he has notions of "en-dOw-ing" something.
 Sam is the last of the old prOspec- tOrs-simple, kindly, brave. And at eighty mine he is still walking over the mountains in paths he trOd when he was a lad.-Milwaukee Journal.