The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1929-09-27
prom the Minneapolis Journalo

From the Minneapolis Journal)
They called themselves the Ne-con-
dis-the Indian word for a band Of
brothers-these seven lean men who
discovered the greatest iron mines In
America.
These seven, woodsmen from first
to last found the rich MeSsaba iron
range in northern Minnesota and had
the faith and the intelligence to devel-
op 1t. They wrote into the history OF
the state one of its most romantic and
astonishing chapters, the chapter that
deals with red ore. Their discoveries
made millions for others and nothing
for themselves and revolutionized the
steel industry of the nation.
But even more astonishing than the
story of the seven finding iron where
biologists and miners with much more
book lore and actual mineral expert
ence to their credit had proved con-
clusively there could be no iron is the
story of the faith and the loyalty OF
the seven men The little band OF
brothers" was staunch and true through
the incredible 20-year wild goose
chase ending in triumph and tragedy"
and-even more astounding
equally loyal when it was lost in the
jungles of cut-throat finance after the
discovery.
For the story of the Messaba iron
range is first, last and always the story
of q family, a lusty, courageous, un-
educated pioneer family, family rails
ed ON fish and potatoes Merritt
family of Minnesota
Paul De Kruif, whose 'Microbe Hun
tiers" and Hunger Fighters" won him
a great popular following, now has
turned his attention to iron ore and
has written the story Of the Merritt
family in Seven Iron Men" just OF
the presses The book is published by
Harcourt, Brace & Company.
1t is a vivid, colorful story that De
Kruif has written, the story of in
Vulnerable hardShips and diSappoint-
ments and of few successes, great for
moment, that in turn became disap-
pointments. Most of all it is the story
Of the love of seven men for each
other and the faith of a SON in his
fathers vision
De Kruif has written of the coming
of the Merritts to Minnesota, of the
growth of the sons in the country
around Duluth while their father work
ed and proSpected, Of the fathers pro-
phecy that The iron mines up under
the Messaba VIII be worth all tho gold in
California" of the sons and the grand
sons Of that prophet who found those
mines while the rest of the world
laughed at them, who invented mar
Velously cheap way to get the iron out
Of the earth when experts said it
couldn't be mined, who built rail-
road to carry the ore to Lake Superior
when financiers refused to build it for
them, and who then lost every penny
they should have made from these
enormously rich mines when they be-
came entangled with John D. Rookie
teller and his associates.
He has written wildly of the seven
men and their years in the forests
when they looked for white pine and
iron and found the pine but not the
iron. He has made each one a color
ful inquire.
ANY story of the Merritts must
needs start of with Lewis and Hep
zibeth, who were responsible for the
sons and the grandsons who found the
iron. HepAbeth, De Kruif has let us
see in his first paragraph:
Though Hepzbeth Merritt weighed
hardly more than hundred pounds,
she was remarkable for being the
mother of eight boys, all husky, and
of one boy and girl who died; she
was the mother and grandmother of
the seven iron men whose rise and
fall this story tells. In the year 1856
this wtry dame-after the manner of
her breed and the fashion of her
times-set sail from mild, corn-fed
Ohio toward the steel-gray water of
Lake Superior, of Kitchi Gammi, of
the great cold lake that sits so
strangely in rim of iron ;"
We don't see Hepzibeth again,
though her serene spirit broods over
the entire book, until SO years later,
her s0th birthday, when she rides out