Public Service and politicians.

Government infrastructure is as important as the university in advancing and facilitating mineral exploration and development. Both the politicians and the public servants have a role to play. The development of government services in the field of minerals in Saskatchewan was fairly recent. C. A. L. (Vern) Hogg was involved in this process from 1944 on. He tells of the highlights of this development and talks about some of the key people involved.

I joined the Department of Natural Resources in 1944 in the capacity of a geologist.

At the time, the Mines Branch consisted of a supervisor, a clerk, and two secretaries. There was no program for geological mapping or any other activity and there was no budget.

It was called the Department of Natural Resources, with Mines as a branch. J. (Joe) L. Phelps was the Minister of the Department. Negotiations were started with the federal government in connection with a resource inventory in Canada. They were preparing to assist financially and cooperate with the provinces in the preparation of this inventory. These negotiations included providing the federal authorities with information about our Department and its work.

In 1946, I was appointed Assistant Deputy Minister for the Department and later in 1947, Deputy Minister. My activities were mainly administrative: developing the programs, organizing the Department and the staff and obtaining personnel, especially for our planned mapping program.

We started in 1947, to utilize the professors in the Geology Department of the University, mapping summer projects. Quite frequently, I would go into the field and see the actual conditions in which they were working. I also discussed with them the mineral potential of the area and the geology.

We started with Dr Byers from the University in the Amisk Lake area, then we employed Dr Mawdsley with a party north of La Ronge. That year we started our mapping program with two or three parties, that would have been in 1947.

The first Supervisor of Mines, when I joined the Department, was a Mr Swain, who had come from the federal government when the resources were Service There was no program for geological mapping or any other activity and there was no budget.

It was called the Department of Natural Resources, with Mines as a branch. J. (Joe) L. Phelps was the Minister of the Department.

Negotiations were started with the federal government in connection with a resource inventory in Canada. They were preparing to assist financially and cooperate with the provinces in the preparation of this inventory.

These negotiations included providing the federal authorities with information about our Department and its work.

In 1946 I was appointed Assistant Deputy Minister for the Department, and later, in 1947, Deputy Minister. My activities were mainly administrative: developing the programs, organizing the Department and the staff, and obtaining personnel, especially for our planned mapping program.

We started in 1947 to utilize the professors in the Geology Department of the University, mapping summer projects.

Quite frequently I would go into the field and see the actual conditions in which they were working. I also discussed with them the mineral potential of the area and the geology.

We started with Dr Byers from the University in the Amisk Lake area, then we employed Dr Mawdsley with a party north of La Ronge. In that year we started our mapping program with two or three parties, that would have been in 1947.

The first Supervisor of Mines when I joined the Department, was a Mr Swain, who had come from the federal government when the resources were Supervisor, or Director as he was called, was W. J. Bichan and he was there for two or three years. Then there was Jim Cawley, who joined the Department in 1950 or '51, and who succeeded me as Deputy Minister in 1957.

We had an assistant to the director, a Mr. Swanson, an extremely valuable man to the Department, since he was well acquainted with oil exploration. And then there was Don Sheridan, the Mining Recorder, and his assistant, Bernie Gooding.

We started to establish resident geologists in the active areas. We put the first one in Uranium City when the uranium prospecting rush took place there, during the years 1947 to '49. His name was Ted Ellingham, the resident geologists provided a very valuable service, as they kept the Department up to date on the activities in their areas. They also assisted prospectors, when a mining company geologist came into the area, it was their job to answer any enquiries. The policy of the Government during the time I was Deputy Minister was to promote the exploration and development of mineral resources and to attract prospectors and companies to Saskatchewan. We would send geologists to the Prospectors and Developers Conventions in the East, and other professional societies, to give papers about the geology and the possibilities for prospectors in Saskatchewan.

In 1954, we started airborne surveys - first a magnetic survey in an area north of La Ronge. This was followed in 1955 and 1956 by electromagnetic surveys.

And then there was the Prospectors' Assistance Plan - the Government would assist the prospector by supplying equipment, and also provide him with some flying time, to move him into an area and move him later from place to place.

We also had prospectors' classes, in places such as Ile-a-la-Crosse and Buffalo Narrows, so that the Native people could obtain information on how minerals are discovered and the best places to look for them. Malcolm Norriss was in charge of these projects.

We developed regulations so that prospectors and small companies could obtain large areas, called reservations, to prospect.

Actually, at that time the large companies were not interested in uranium, believing that there was no market. It was only when the United States established a price of $10 a pound that they did show any interest. Then a company could sell uranium to Eldorado, the federal crown company, you couldn't sell to anyone else - you had to sell to the government. At that time, large companies started to come in and obtain reservations, which could be held for a certain length of time. Gunnar Mines was discovered on one of these reservations, by Albert Zeemel.

I should like to pay tribute to the staff in Mineral Resources, their job was to help develop Saskatchewan - a thrilling kind of project, which they took seriously. After I left the Government I heard interesting expressions of goodwill towards the staff of the Department of Mineral Resources. I might explain that in 1953, the Mineral Resources Branch had been separated from Natural Resources. By then all these developments had taken place and by now the staff of four in 1946 had grown to over 100, and the duties were such as to require more personal attention from the Minister.So they were separated from renewable resources, I think that was necessary. Again I say this development could not have happened without good staff, civil servants have to be creative, too.

Vern Hogg has referred to Don Sheridan, the Province's first Mining Recorder. Here is how Don himself, describes the work of his Branch during those days.

I answered an ad in the paper, at that time Wilf Churchman was Chief Clerk of Natural Resources. He indicated to me that Sullivan, who was taking care of this area, was going to resign and he'd be looking out for a mining recorder since mining was just beginning to roll. I took the job and when Sullivan retired I became Chief Mining Recorder, that was in 1947, the Minister then was J. L. Phelps.

We recorded mineral claims in the Precambrian and we had recording offices at Flin Flon and Prince Albert and we subsequently established one at Uranium City. Before my time, there had been one at Goldfields, but they closed that down after mining activity moved from there to Uranium City.

We also looked after gravel claims and what little oil "play" there was. There were only four of us in the Branch, Walter Hastings, a mining engineer who was called a Mines Inspector and who devoted his time exclusively to coal; Watson, who specialized in sodium sulphate; Frank Brazier; and myself.

Our first crown-owned operation in mining was in sodium sulphate, that would have been around 1950. The four people in Regina I refer to were employees of the Department of Natural Resources, so we didn't devote ourselves entirely to mining. For example, the Recorder at Flin Flon was also what we'd call today, the Conservation Officer, a Field Officer, he was an ex - RCMP man by the name of Ottway. I don't think there were more than 400 or 500 claims staked in 1947, this eventually reached a peak of 20,000 in later years.

When we became a Department in 1953, we overhauled the regulations, but before we did that, we went out and met with the mining people and discussed it with them informally.

A chap who was responsible for doing a lot of the leg work was Malcolm Norris, Malcolm and I used to visit all through the North, at the request of Vern Hogg, the Deputy Minister, when the Minerals Branch became a Department.Initially, we only had one minister, and he was John H. (Brock) Brockelbank, he had a deputy minister for each branch.

So Vern Hogg had to shoulder a bit more of the load, getting a new department going and bringing these new regulations into effect. The first regulations we used had been handed down from the federal government, they had been patched up here and there and had to be revised.

Don Sheridan had a lot to do with the appointment of personnel who could perform the required duties and at the same time, be presentable representatives of the Government.

We wanted to set up a record office in La Ronge and we were looking around for someone to man the office, be by himself, and be a good representative of the Department. Tony Wood's name was mentioned, I believe he was in Prince Albert at the time, but not with the Government. Brockelbank, who was our Minister, was very conscious of public relations, so he had us check out Tony and we hired him. We were also setting up a full - time recording office at Flin Flon, one of Brock's army buddies wrote him and said he knew a chap by the name of Bruce Long, Bruce had been in the army and had become an alcoholic.Brock said, "Never mind check him out", so I talked to Bruce and he told me the whole story, that he was an alcoholic, but that he was a new member of A.A. I said to him, "Do you know what this job entails? You are going to be smack in the middle of the mining town of Flin Flon, a drinking town, where the chief recreation besides hockey is drinking" He said, "Yes, I do". I reported back to Brockelbank, and Brock said, "Let's give him a try", Bruce Long turned out to be one of the best mining recorders we've ever had.

We had another chap by the name of MacDonald, he was our full - time Mining Recorder at Uranium City. He had a medical problem - apoplexy, but he was the man we wanted, so I went and saw his doctor. At that time in Uranium City there was no medical attention, the doctor saw no difficulty provided he didn't booze it up and didn't forget to take his medication, so we hired him and he made it.

Bruce Long was established as Mining Recorder in Flin Flon because the local prospectors needed this service closer than Prince Albert. Bruce recalls when he started.

I came here in 1954 as Mining Recorder, The Prospectors' Association requested one as the only other recorders were in Prince Albert and Uranium City. There were a lot of prospectors based in Flin Flon, men who worked both the Manitoba and Saskatchewan sides of the boundary. Mining activity in this area started very early, with Gold first. The old Monarch Mine on the northwest shore of Amisk Lake was in operation years ago, and there were many other gold showings. The old Graham property was to the north of the lake and production was attempted there - it must have been back in the twenties - because most of those properties were patented under the federal government, before the resources being turned over to the Province in 1930.There was the old Henning Maloney Mine, close to Creighton, and the old Newcor Mine, hardly a mile out. The Mosher Brothers sank a bit of shaft at Phantom Lake, I don't know if it got into operation or not, Mosher Lake is named after the brothers. They wanted a recorder here for the sake of convenience, to record claims and obtain maps. We explained the regulations to them, provided all the forms, and assisted them in filling them out. My office was in Flin Flon at that time, on the Manitoba side, later the government offices were built out in Creighton, Saskatchewan, across the border, in about 1964.

Scarfe, the present (1975) Mining Recorder at La Ronge, started with the Department of Mineral Resources in 1954, so for 22 years Al has been very close to what goes on in the field.

I started as the Mining Recorder at Uranium City on May 5, 1954, the Department of Mineral Resources had been formed from the Department of Natural Resources in 1953. The Prince Albert office was opened in 1952, and the staff there at that time consisted of Malcolm Norris, who was in charge of the Prospectors' Assistance Plan and Betty Rick, who served as his clerk - typist and also did the mining recorder's duties. That office was in operation until late 1964 or '65 and then it was closed down entirely and the La Ronge office was expanded. At that time, La Ronge was a sub - mining recorder's office under Tony Wood, and it was expanded to take in the duties normally done by both offices.

The Creighton [Flin Flon] Office was handled by the Conservation Officer as one of several duties. In 1954, the mining recorder's position was filled by Bruce Long, who is still there, now in Creighton, Saskatchewan.

The Uranium City office was established in 1952 on a very small scale, it started with a tent, I believe. It expanded gradually, so that in 1953 a Resident Geologist, Ted Ellingham, was appointed.

The tent was there only in the summer and was occupied by Don Sheridan. It was occupied by several other people coming and going. Bill MacDonald was Mining Recorder before me coming there in 1954, I was there until 1965.

Also during that period, in about 1957, the position of mines inspector, with a completely separate building, came about as there were eight or nine uranium mining operations going on at that time. There were a couple of temporary ones, but within a matter of a year Herb Aitcheson was appointed full-time, and he remained there until about 1963.

At the Prince Albert office, Helga Moltke (now Reydon) was more than a secretary, she was a part-time mining recorder and receptionist. She developed a deep love for the North and the people in it, especially that "rare breed" with whom she came in contact every day - the prospectors.

I started in the Prince Albert Recording Office in 1960, I was the office staff, the total office staff - I was it. When they were all gone I was a sort of Assistant Mining Recorder, I used to make maps when needed, and when people came in and wanted to know how to stake claims, I would help.

I worked with Claude Morrison, Ray Williams, and Malcolm Norris, Claude was the Mining Recorder and was in charge of the office. Ray Williams was Mineral Claims Inspector, and Malcolm Norris was mainly in the field of education, handling the Prospectors' Schools, which had started. He was a marvellous teacher, and he organized things so well, he had some special lectures at the Penitentiary and I would sometimes go there with him. So I saw him teaching, he was so interested in the subject of mining, and in helping people. He brought to his teaching a great enthusiasm, as he did to everything he did, he was a very unusual man, Claude was away a fair amount, so when he was, I was it.

Ray Williams, as Mineral Claims Inspector, was another very efficient man. He had a very mathematical mind, a very good bridge player and he travelled a great deal on claims inspection, to make sure the claims were properly staked and registered. If there was any dispute he would have to go out into the field and check things over. He travelled from one end of northern Saskatchewan to the other and he was on the go all the time and he had to be a bit of a bushman too.

We sold reports and maps, the maps were so much per copy, and we printed them on the big machine in the basement. We had to handle the money from the maps and from the fees the stakers had to pay when they registered their claims. There were many different types of maps - claims maps, geological maps, topographical maps, and aerial magnetic maps, all of which were of great help to anyone in the prospecting field. They needed a lot of information and we had a good library, I feel we gave good service.

We met very many interesting and colourful people, among them was Charlie Swenson, who'd been in mining ever since he came from Sweden. Then there was Curly Lanetti, there were three of them, the other was George Findlay who lives here in Prince Albert now. That was one of the nicest things - meeting people like them.

Then there was another, up in Uranium City - Gus Hawker, he was a very rare, now extinct, type of animal. A most amazing person, you didn't believe all he told you, but you had fun, and the stories!

Claude Morrison was the first Mining Recorder stationed in Prince Albert.

When I became Mining Recorder in Prince Albert in 1953 I didn't know one mineral claim from another and had never been up North. I had a fellow with me, a fellow by the name of Malcolm Norris, an old friend of yours, and he'd been all over and he knew quite a bit about it, I got a lot of instructions from him.

We established the first office in the government building, then we moved over to the old Bank of Ottawa building on First Avenue West. That building had been built in 1899.

Then we moved back to what is now the Motor License Office in the government building. The first few years we were not too busy, but by 1954 things started to pick up, in that year we recorded about 12,000 claims. This rose so that by 1957 when we had that big "rush", we reached 30,000 claims. It all went through the office here in Prince Albert, but by that time we had a sub-office in La Ronge, a fellow by the name of Tony Wood ran it. Tony still lives in La Ronge.

We had four or five geological parties out in the field, when I was first Mining Recorder I had to go out and expedite and get them going. But when it got bigger, they had their own men to do that, Malcolm Norris did a lot of that, and as well he looked after the Prospectors' Assistance Plan.

The Prospectors' Assistance Plan (PAP), was a plan whereby the government provided everything, including grub, flying, and all the information they needed, free of charge. I think that Saskatchewan was the first province to do this, B.C. had a very small scheme, but Saskatchewan was the first to implement such an extensive plan. We were criticized, especially by the big mining companies, they didn't like the competition. But it wasn't very long before they were taking advantage of it and placing their own men under the Plan. It's like everything else - when something is new until people learn something about it, they don't like it.

We had a Prospectors' School at La Ronge, usually with about 30 students, it was held in the old Smoke Jumpers' Building. As instructors, we had about three geologists, Malcolm Norris, and myself. The school lasted three weeks. They were taught the fundamentals of prospecting and geology and staking claims, and a lot of them, like Weirzicki, Tarnowski, and Parada, got their start as prospectors at the school.

There was a couple from B.C. - the Hurds - and John Albrecht and his wife, who went out together under the PAP. Then there was Miss Wheaton, and Vern Hogg's daughter, at that time Vern Hogg was Deputy Minister and his daughter wasn't more than sixteen. I understand she is a graduate geologist now, then of course, there was Vicki Nemanishen who was at the school once or twice, she lives at Meath Park.

We also put on a three weeks' school at the Penitentiary every winter we didn't have to provide room and board; it was already provided for! There were one or two who went out prospecting later, but most of them would go back to their home provinces and we wouldn't know what happened to them. I went there for seven courses and one fellow took all seven courses, he was the one who came out and started that diamond rush just north of here, a few years later.

Gradually government's role in mining increased, until today, the Government is a full fledged partner in exploration, leading to production. I put a question to Dave Smith, "The organization of which you are now Chief Engineer, the Saskatchewan Mining Development Corporation, must have come out of first, a political decision by the Cabinet, through a Minister of Mineral Resources, and secondly plans had to be laid to set the thing up. Who was the Minister who laid out the original proposal?

Elwood Cowley was the Minister at the time the Corporation was formed, in 1974, but it didn't work quite that way.

I've written the history of this, so I'm not telling secrets, actually what happened was that in 1974 Uranerz approached the Government to take a one - third interest in the program they were doing at the edge of the Athabasca Sandstone. They made the approach, this is all I've been able to find out, anyway, their proposal was accepted by the Government and then the Government had to set up a vehicle to take over the contract. SMDC was formed, not only to accept the joint venture program but also to act as the exploration and mining arm of the Government.

The terms of reference cover everything but sodium sulphate and potash and also they permit, not only exploration, but development, mining, marketing, everything else. Now we are working only on uranium. This is my understanding of why and how the Corporation was formed.

In 1974, there was just a Board of Directors, with Dave Francis as Vice-Chairman, all through 1975, Dr Gerry Pollock and Dave Francis acted as managers and I as Two-I-C, That is, I did everything that nobody else would do.

We operated this way until December of 1975 when Dave Francis was appointed General Manager. Dr. Pollock was appointed Joint Venture Manager.

In the middle of January, 1976, and I was appointed as Manager of Administrative Services, since then we have hired an Exploration Manager.

We now have the combined job of Accounting and Administrative Manager, with myself as Chief Engineer.

I don't know whether it is common knowledge or not, but the provincial government took over one-third share that was owned by another company. So the interest in Uranerz has not been reduced. The other thing is they have all the federal government will allow them.

Actualy, we don't know a great deal about the details of the Key Lake discovery at this time, other than the fact that they have drilled several holes between Sea Horse Lake and Karl Ernst Lake. They have outlined an orebody something in the order of 1000 metres long, a variable width, from 15 to 100 metres. The thickness we don't know, exactly. The grades have been quoted as averaging about 2.5 per cent uranium oxide and fairly recently, in August of 1976, they announced a second orebody, it looks good. The grade seems to be about the same, so we're talking in terms of 40 to 50 million pounds of uranium oxide, enough to start a mine on. The gross value at $40 a pound is 1.6 billion dollars.

Our corporation, SMDC, is in six approved joint ventures with mining companies that are being operated; 14 have been approved in principle, and three more proposals are being considered. In addition, we have six exploration programs going in the field this summer. We are involved with a Japanese concern, Eldorado, and others. Some of them are very involved, with as many as fourteen partners. Europeans are accustomed to working with governments, I don't know why Canadian companies shouldn't agree too. They don't seem to be too reluctant, since in every case they have approached us. There is nothing mandatory about the plan, and we cannot touch claims that were staked after March 1 of last year (1975), so it looks as if they are quite willing to work with us.

Gordon Bragg, the geologist with Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting Company, says private corporations yet have to be convinced of the value, and workability, of joint ventures with governments. He does, however, have hopes the difficulties may be surmounted.

The main feature that affected our operations in Saskatchewan was the problem the potash companies were having with the Government.I think mainly the problem developed two years ago when this new tax structure was developed. The company was very upset about it, to the extent that they decided to withdraw practically all exploration in Saskatchewan until these problems were resolved. We haven't changed that much yet, although I feel I detect a slight softening, my expenditures in Saskatchewan, certainly for base metals, have been negligible for 1976.

We've been looking at the uranium thing and have started working with the Saskatchewan Mining Association on uranium royalty schedules. We did not like some of the features proposed by the Government, but certainly, they improved through a discussion with the companies over the original proposal put forward by the Government.If you have a relatively high-grade mine, such as Gulf, Amok, or Key Lake, you can live with it. But if you're going to think of operating on a grade, say, of Blind River (Ontario) I think you might as well forget it, under this 3 per cent gross royalty. It will knock out the low-grade, marginal stuff.

Regina recognizes this, but they feel that with the discoveries that have been made, there is no shortage of uranium in Saskatchewan at the moment. The marginal ones could possibly be brought into production 30 years from now, but they are not prepared to change the regulations to allow the marginal producers to come into production at this time. So this takes away from the exploration company that wants to work in Saskatchewan.

Government participation started a few years back, I think SOQUEM, the crown corporation in Quebec, got along with private industry very well.They didn't have any special privileges, they had to compete for ground. If this is the route the provinces out West take, I don't think there will be any problems. In fact, Hudson Bay voluntarily had a joint venture with Manitoba's crown corporation. Although there were problems in Manitoba separating the corporation from the Government a couple of years ago, I think that this is all behind us now. We're hopeful we can look at the Saskatchewan Mining Development Corporation as a crown company completely isolated from the Department of Mineral Resources.

In this history, we are concerned with two arms of government - administrative and political. J. L. Phelps, the politician, was Minister of Natural Resources of which Mineral Resources was a Branch, from 1944 to 1948. Talking to him now, one gets the impression that it was with some trepidation that the new CCF government of 1944 confronted the task of administering the mineral industry.

My thinking was quite simple, quite straightforward - a partnership deal between the government and private operators, a straight partnership. I didn't want the Government to go in and start to develop a mine. It wasn't in my thinking, because we were beginners, beginners in industry, beginners all the way around in that particular field. "It was so new and, of course, at that particular time, the value of minerals wasn't as well understood by the public, including ourselves. Looking back we didn't realize, I'm sure, the degree of importance that minerals present, to any country, to Saskatchewan, and the other provinces. It was a wheat economy, and the natural resources (renewable) were more in peoples' thinking, and my thinking - fish, timber, fur, and so on.

in order to determine the point at which the Saskatchewan Government started seriously to consider deeper involvement in the mining industry, the question was put to Joe Phelps: "In your opinion when was the first time the Government started thinking about involving itself in the minerals industry? Did it come after your time, or during it? . . . "

It came during my time. We were giving it some consideration, but the only case I can recall was at Flin Flon - Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting - we were beginning to discuss the matter of taking some shares in that operation. That was during the last year I was in the Government, 1948.

Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting had an exceptionally good deal with the Government, probably because they were going into new country, far beyond anything that had been developed until that time. That, of course, was before my time. But even when I came into the picture there was a road into Flin Flon, and that's about all.

In dealing with the company I found that they were very fine people to deal with, and were not hard to live with. They recognized that our policy was to have some say and be more active, and to get a better deal for the Province as a whole. It was just a matter of deciding how much. They had the old royalty agreement, which I didn't think was right to break at that time. After all the Government had made it before our time, and we had to make the best of it and improve it as we went along.

J. H. Brockelbank succeeded Joe Phelps as Minister after Phelp's defeat in 1948. During his administration, a separate Department of Mineral Resources was formed. A more up-front government role seemed to evolve during his administration. . . .

I had quite an interest in resources because I lived near the edge of the farming area, so I was familiar with renewable resources. I remember meeting people who had done prospecting in the North.

In 1944, when our government was formed, I became Minister of Municipal Affairs, for four years. During this period Joe Phelps was Minister of Natural Resources. He was defeated in 1948 and I was then appointed Minister of Natural Resources.

Natural Resources at that time included all the resources - minerals, oil, and renewable resources. In 1953 the Department was divided into two - one continued with the name of Natural Resources, and the other became the Department of Mineral Resources.

Before the election in 1944, when we were in opposition, I was not responsible for Natural Resources. It was Myron Feeley, who just died. Now there are two of the original eleven left, of which I am one.

At any rate, the Department was divided, and we had two deputy ministers, so one of them specialized in minerals. A good deal of credit is due to Joe Phelps, who preceded me. He had got some very interesting people into the Department, people who were very interested in resources, such as Vern Hogg, who was my first Deputy Minister of Mineral Resources. He was a good one.

I kept both Departments until 1956 when Alex Kuziak took over Natural Resources, and I kept Mineral Resources until 1962 when I went to the Treasury Department.

During 1947, the discovery of the Leduc oil field in Alberta started a great land play there. During the next year or two it bubbled over into Saskatchewan. We had all our sedimentary areas under some kind of disposition, either as an exploration permit or lease. Then the companies came in and started to drill wells. The only hard rock mine we had in operation when we were elected in 1944 was Hudson Bay Mining and Smelting at Flin Flon. When we took office they were making millions of dollars in profits, and paying millions of dollars in income taxes to the federal government. When a company can't get out of paying income tax to the federal government, they're making lots of profit, you can be sure. They were paying less than $200,000 annually to the Province of Saskatchewan, my figures may be a little out, but not much.

Joe Phelps did quite a bit to cure that and pretty soon they were paying a million dollars a year, which in those days looked like quite a lot of money. We had a problem at Flin Flon, there was a settlement on the Saskatchewan side of the border. You see, the mine is located in both provinces, and the mill is built on the boundary, partly in one province and partly in the other. A number of the employees at the mine were building in Saskatchewan and developing a settlement. It was finally organized and called Creighton, after Tom Creighton, one of the discoverers of the mine.

The company had an agreement with the town of Flin Flon, on the Manitoba side, whereby the company paid the town and schools grant instead of taxes, but there was no agreement with the Saskatchewan side. So when I took over the Department, we were faced with the job of working out an agreement. Well, I remember the day we proposed this agreement to the company, Mr. Green, "Baldy" Green, general manager of the mine, was at the meeting. We had the plan all worked out, and patterned pretty well along the lines of the Manitoba agreement. When I explained the plan and read it out, Mr Green really went up in the air, but he came down and we got along pretty well, but he still felt the deal was pretty stiff.

The arrangement was a per capita grant and made it possible to have facilities on the Saskatchewan side, later of course, it was organized as a village.

When the Liberals were elected in 1964, mineral exploration in Saskatchewan was at a low ebb. Alex Cameron, Minister of Mines in the Thatcher government, recalls the terms of the Incentive Program which they designed to increase exploration activity in the province ....

We found that out of a 45 million dollar mining exploration budget in Canada by private companies in 1963, we were getting less than one percent. There were very few people involved in mineral exploration at that time in northern Saskatchewan. We'd always talked about the great mineral potential of northern Saskatchewan, but talking about something as a potential, and having something, are two different things.

Therefore we developed what we called the Incentive Program, where the Government became a partner with industry and shared the costs.

We went to the industry and devised the program with them, they came in rather hesitantly at first; they didn't know whether it would be successful or not.

We said that for every dollar a company or individual spent on exploration we'd throw in a dollar, so their dollar became a fifty cent investment.

This was to a limit of $50,000 on any one property per year, to a total limit of $150,000, there were no strings attached. If after all the work of prospecting, mapping, drilling, etc., nothing came of it, the loan was forgiven.

On the other hand, if a mine developed, the money the Government advanced had to be paid back at a low rate of interest, over a period of years, this was in 1965. We found the companies did take hold and they did move in, in great numbers.