(L to R) Award Presenter, Edward Thompson; Prospectors of the Year Winners, Mac Watson, Richard E. Nemis, John D. Harvey, Donald Hoy, Neil D. Novak

For an extensive list of articles on this mineral discovery, please go to: Ontario’s Ring of Fire Mineral Discovery

The PDAC Bill Dennis Prospector of the Year Award honors the memory of past PDAC president Bill Dennis who was one of the association’s staunchest supporters during its formative years and a prominent and respected prospector. This award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry.

John D. Harvey, Donald Hoy, Richard Nemis, Neil D. Novak and Mac Watson are recognized for the significant base metals and chromite discoveries in northern Ontario’s Ring of Fire.

In 2002, Neil Novak, as vice-president of Spider Resources Inc., was seeking kimberlites in the James Bay lowlands in a joint venture with KWG Resources Inc.

Novak had found 1.1-billion-year-old, diamond-bearing kimberlites under 130 metres of sand and limestone. De Beers Canada Exploration, curious about Novak’s work, formed a JV with Spider-KWG to look at their geophysical and geochemical database.

Novak’s expertise led De Beers to launch a reverse-circulation drill program near McFauld’s Lake, northern Ontario.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors. The William (Bill) W. Dennis Prospector of the Year Award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry.

Originally looking for diamonds, in 1993, Albert Chislett and Chris Verbiski instead, discovered one of the world’s major nickel sulphide deposits near Nain, Labrador. The deposit was eventually bought by Inco Limited and most experts confirm the deposit will be a major source of nickel and regional prosperity for generations to come.

Mr. Chislett was born in Islington, Trinity Bay, Newfoundland in 1949. After studying business administration at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute in Toronto, and working in the accounting department at Swift Premium in Ontario for five years, he established a successful construction company in St. John’s and operated it for 15 years.

His interest in geology and mineral exploration began in the late 1980s, stemming in part from his love of the outdoors. In 1988 he started operating an independent mineral exploration company and began prospecting full time. He was soon one of the most active prospectors in the province, and was the first to receive a provincial Prospector’s Assistance Program grant.

Read the rest of this entry »

 The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors. The William (Bill) W. Dennis Prospector of the Year Award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry.

Charles E. Fipke discovered Canada’s first diamond mine in the Northwest Territories about 300 kilometers northwest of Yellowknife.

Mr. Fipke is recognized as a leader in the diamond indicator mineral industry and has published a number of papers and articles that are widely used in the industry. In 1983, he founded Dia Met Minerals Ltd. The company went public the following year with the help of many local Kelowna investers.

As founder of the company, Mr. Fipke is credited with the original discovery of the Point Lake diamondiferous kimberlite pipe, where diamonds, including those of gem quality, were returned from drilling and bulk sampling program. The discovery was made after more than ten years of tenacious field exploration.

Mr. Fipke was born in Edmonton and received a bachelor of science degree (honours) in geology from the University of British Columbia. In the early part of his career, he worked as a geologist for Kennecott Copper Company in New Guinea; for Samedoan Oil Company in North Queensland, Australia; and for Johnesburg Consolidated Investments, in Barberton, South Africa.

Read the rest of this entry »

 The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors. The William (Bill) W. Dennis Prospector of the Year Award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry.

In 1961, while prospecting for a syndicate funded by Fred Jowsey of Denison Mine fame, Walter Baker discovered a 3,000 foot long gold bearing shear west of the Williams Claim that hosted a small gold resource formerly drilled by Teck Hughes.

He would go down in mining history as the old Kirkland Lake prospector who first suggested to Donald McKinnon that claims around the CPR whistle-stop of Hemlo might be worth looking into. Mr. McKinnon did look at those claims in northwestern Ontario and they are now the site of three of Canada’s major gold mines and many in the mining industry, might consider this prospector of wide repute as the “godfather” of the Hemlo mining camp.

Born in 1904 on the east side of Lake Winnipeg in the small village of Manigotogan, Manitoba, Walter Baker began prospecting at the age of nineteen in the Rice Lake Greenstone Belt.

He joined the San Antonio Gold Mine exploration staff in his early twenty’s and prospected almost every summer for that company focusing on virtually all of the remote greenstone belts extending through northwestern Ontario and northeastern Manitoba up until 1950. That year, he accepted a prospecting position for Teck Hughes and for the next nine years worked for that company using Kirkland Lake as a base.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors. The William (Bill) W. Dennis Prospector of the Year Award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry. 

Alex Mosher came from a family that has been mining and prospecting in Canada for three generations. Although born in 1900 at the Eureka Gold Mine in Nova Scotia, Alex grew up and started is prospecting career in Cobalt.

In 1927, with his brother Murdock, he staked the Central Patricia gold mines. He played a key part in staking the Ashley Gold Mines in the Matachewan area in 1930. The following year, again along with his brother, staked a bloc of claims during the Little Long Lac staking rush that later became the Mosher Long Lac Gold Mines.

He participated in the first gold discovery in Yellowknife in 1938.

He also located and staked the first radioactive vein in 1947 at Otter Rapids on the Abitibi River, the first of its kind outside of the Northwest Territories, discovered the iron-ore Griffith Mine at Bruce Lake in 1953, in Northwestern Ontario, and the Chimo Gold Mines in Quebec in the mid-sixties.

During 1967 and 1968, Mr. Mosher was president of PDAC and together with W.W. Denis gave guidance and support to the Association in its early struggle to stay alive and effective. He was also inducted into the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame in 1990.

The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors. The William (Bill) W. Dennis Prospector of the Year Award is presented to individuals or groups who have made a significant mineral discovery, offered noteworthy contributions to the PDAC, or have been involved in some important service or technological invention or innovation that helped improve the Canadian prospecting and exploration industry. 

The world-class Hemlo deposit was the major gold discovery in Canada during the 1980s and is still responsible for a significant portion of Ontario’s gold production. The three individuals who were responsible for discovering one of the country’s richest gold camps were Don McKinnon, John Larche and David Bell.

John Larche first became involved in mining and exploration in 1943, when he worked on diamond drills and underground at the Preston East Dome Mine. In 1955, Larche became an independent prospector and mining exploration contractor. He has concentrated his prospecting in Ontario and Quebec with some work in Manitoba, Nova Scotia and the Northwest Territories.

Larche has been involved in a number of staking rushes, including Mattagami in the 1950s, Kidd Township in the 1960s – he staked the Windfall claims – and Hemlo.

Until 1964, Don McKinnon had only dabbled in prospecting. That year, along with John Larche and Fred Rousseau, they staked and sold the Windfall property and he has worked in prospecting ever since.

Read the rest of this entry »

The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) represents the interests of the Canadian mineral exploration and development industry. The association was established in 1932 in response to a proposed government regulation that threatened the livelihood of Ontario prospectors.

Today, 76 years after its founding, the association is a national organization with 6,000 individual members (including prospectors, developers, geoscientists, consultants, mining executives, and students, as well as those involved in the drilling, financial, investment, legal and other support fields) and 950 corporate members (including senior, mid-size and junior mining companies and organizations providing services to the mineral industry).

The Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada did not give out awards for most of its first 50 years of existence. That was to change, during the presidency of Ed Thompson (1977-78). Mr. Thompson got the idea of setting up the PDAC’s awards, when he attended the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum awards ceremony, in 1977.

“It’s important to acknowledge the special contributions of people and nobody was really honoring prospectors or people who were developing mines,” he said.

The first award was the Bill Dennis Prospector of the Year Award. Other awards have been added over the years including the Viola R. MacMillan Developer’s Award, the Distinguished Service Award, The E3 Environmental Award, the Special Achievement Award and more recently the Mary-Claire Ward GeoScience Award, Thayer Lindsley International Discovery Award.

Over the next few months, I will be posting profiles of the many winners over the past quarter century in random order. The first posting will be about the three individuals who discovered the enormously rich Hemlo gold deposit in northern Ontario.