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a me! , wy i oe Ih eae Pen Pictures Sailor, Prospector and Engineer RUSS FLEMING If gregariousness is truly the solace for the mediocre then the antithesis is also true and finds functional proof in the person of Fred Thompson.. Of the many people who live and work in Hail- eybury and meet and chat with Fred on the street, few would dare suspect the adventurous soul which he harbours. Most people _know him through business ac- quaintance as a mining engineer, quiet and retiring as he goes about his business: To emphasize I will take the lib- erty of quoting liberally from "Free Gold'? the story of Cana- dian mining by Arnold Hoffman. In this book Mr. Hoffman has in- cluded the biographies of all the notable Canadian miners who pioneered the industry in Canada. "Fred W. Thompson has the dis- tinction of staking more mines and earning less thereby than any pros- pector in his class. A jpushman with hardly an equal he is defi cient in one réspect, acquisitive instinct. His life has been excit- ing and colourful, and yet mod- esty and self-effacement are as natural to him as braggadocio is to lesser men. Born in London, he attended the "=)\;eenwich Naval School at a ten- eae "er age and became involved in/a boyish prank (painting a red nose on Lord Nelson's statue) and this ended his academic career ab- ruptly. Enlisting in the English Navy, he found the kind of exis- tence that suited his restless tem- perament. All went well until a bullying petty officer singled him out for special attention. Never an aggressor himself, he often evoked pugnacity in others, but always to their ultimate regret. And so it was with the 'petty officer. Af- ter thrashing him soundly, Fred decided to forgo a long term in the brig by sliding down the an- _ ehor hawser and swimming ashore in Sydney -Harbor. There , he was soon lost in the anonymity of the waterfront. The next act occurred on. the sailing vessel Swanhilda on which Fred signed as ordinary seaman. Becalmed enroute to Panama; part of the crew mutinied against a brutal captain: Fred, -the~ chief offender, was thrown into irons, but he managed to escape when the ship docked in Panama. There for a time he worked as a laborer on the Canal project, after which he became first mate on a fruit steamer. Tiring of this, he drifted through Central America and) fi- nally was appointed admiral of the San Salvador Navy, in com- mand of a single ship. When war broke out with Nicaragua, Fred stormed the en- emy port of Corinto. Wounded in the hand by a machete stroke, he nevertheless routed the three-ship Nicaraguan navy led by F.F. Worthington, a Scotsman. By a strange coincidence, the two ad- mirals met again years later un- der different circumstances, this time as: Canadian officers in com- Munications trench during the Somme campaign. Worthington incidentally, remained in the Cana- dian Army and rose*to the rank of major general in World War It. In 1907, Fred received word that his family had emigrated to Cana- da and purchased a farm in north- ern Ontario. In a moment of sen- timentality he decided to join them. For a-time he worked with his father and four brothers at clear- ing the land, but quickly realized that farm life was not for him. Stories of mining stirred his rov- er's blood and in a short while he dropped the plow and assumed the prospector's pick, which he has carried ever since, and there he teamed with Bob Gamble and} Sarkis Markarian, wildcatting be- times' and working underground when funds were short. In 1914 he enlisted in-the famous Borden Battery. Except for a three month's period when he was wounded on the Somme, he re- mained an active machine gunner to the last day of action, at which time he had risen from private to captain. He was one of the few Canadians who received both the Military Medal and Military Cross decorations. In the course of twenty-five years he discovered and staked two producers, Island Lake and Thompson-Lundmark, as well as the O'Neil Thompson (staked with his brother Bert) now a part of the Rouyn Merger. The Donalda was one of his early "'babies", now alas, in other hands, as well as the Arrowhead, Duquesque, and Wright-Rouyn. At one time he turned minemaker and acquired the Golden Manitou in Quebec, a mine now producing almost $2,000, 000 annually. But luck was not with him. One of his associates, enroute to mail a check for claim taxes, was struck by a train in Ottawa. The letter was never mail- ed and consequently the property was lost. The Duquesne, staked by Fred and his brother, Walter, was slow to respond to develop- ment, and the brothers under pressure of necessity, sold their stock too early. The Donalda, which he staked with Robert, was sold for a mere pittahce in the early days, and passed into luck- ter hands, and the Thompson-Lund- mark, which marked the first dis- covery of a Canadian mine from the air, was so involved with par- ticipating syndicates that the luckless discoverer received ~ only 25,000 shares of the 1,250,000 -al- located to the vendors. A devoted father, he left 'his wife and three daughters to en- list in the Canadian Army in 1942: Fred puts even idle time to good use in persuing his hobby of min- eral collecting; he has one of. the largest collections im Ontario. Many of these minerals he has collected himself, others he has traded with other collectors. The minerals come from as far abroad as Brazil, South" Africa, and Alas= ka. One of the high-lights of the collection is his luminous «miner- als which glow brillantly ruby, aqua-marine, and deep blue when exposed to an infra red lamp. In addition 'to this Fred has an authentic Eskimo carving collee- tion and states proudly that he secured these pieces of sculptury before the Eskimoes started car- ving for the tourists." Classified Ads Bring Results FINDLAY » ELECTRIC , HAILEYBURY Cecil St. Dial OS 2-3682% Electrical installations and maintenance, Guaranteed repairs to all household appliances, radios and small motors. We will pick up and deliver anywhere in the Tri-Town area. 4 AF Thursday, March 19, 1959 On Your Library Arches of the Years By Halliday Sutherland In ARCHES OF THE YEARS the author takes us on a lighthearted journey that begins in the High- lands of Scotland before the turn of the century. It was there that the author, a vacationing school boy shot his first roebuck and had his first encounter with the law. Later, as a medical student in Aberdeen, he had a second differ- ence of opinion with authority -- this time concerning cats. On completing his course in pathology, Mr. Sutherland went to the Shetland Islands for a holiday where he joined the crew of the Sven Toyn for a whaling: expedi- tion. The cruise began with his at- tempts to buy herring for break- fast, and a celebrating trio who ended up with an extra boat on board. At the small clinic in southern Spain where he had gone to assist his uncle, he found the work both varied and interesting. Aside from treating patients he learned to cope with anything from a ma- lingering cook to a thief stealing milk from the clinic's goat. Several years after his return to England, the First World War be- gan. He joined the Fleet as a-.sur- geon. As his ship saw no action he was put to work decoding mes- sages and censoring mail. The changing of the Admiralty code and the buying of a microscope in West Afriea are both amusing in- cidents. Based in England again Mr. Sutherland took part in the prep- aration against an invasion -- an invasion which for a very good reason never took place. The Haileyburi helf The journey ends with the Au- thor, after the war, returning to Scotland for a holiday. This is a book that moves at a leisurely pace with plenty of time for amusing anecdotes, tales of folklore, superstitions and obser- vations of customs and manners. * * * You won't know what is in the NEW Cobalt Library until you come and look for yourself. The Library is open from 3 - 5; 7 - 9 o'clock every Tuesday and Friday each week, with the exception of Public. Holidays, and you are in- vited to come in and look for your- self. Membership in the Library As- sociation is $1.00 per year, this is for support of Library only. Read- ing Cards to take books out are 25 cents each with space for about 30 books. You can't get cheaper reading or better reading than at your Publie Library. Murray McKinnon Your Mufual Life Representative 72 Nickel -- Cobolt Dial 4519 Classified Ads Bring Results | ) REPAIR | BEN J. BOURGET ) General Contractor and Estimator Houses Built Repairs and Alterations Boats Made or Repaired FROM EARLTON CONVENIENT DEPARTURES BY TURBO-PROP VISCOUNT TORONTO 1 HR. 55 MINS. MONTREAL 3 HRS. 55 MINS. Connections in Toronto for*major U.S. Centres. Also TCA prop-jet VISCOUNT service to ROUYN-NORANDA, OTTAWA, NORTH BAY, VAL D'OR - daily except Sunday. Ask about TCA's FAMILY FARES and FLY-NOW-PAY-LATER plans for travel in § Canada, the U.S- and Overseas. ae See Nixon, Begg and Hutchinson Travel pilin or phone TCA at Earlton Airport. Phone Earlton 48. ® (is) TRANS-CANADA AIR LINES Page 3