In 1951 Dr. William Smitheringale, a
prominent Canadian geologist, was asked by Fred
M. Connell, president of Conwest Exploration
Company, to examine McDame mountain and make
recommendations with respect to its possible
development as a mine. During those early days
trails and roads were bulldozed through the mire.
Mining machinery was brought in and the tedious
job of scraping the talus fibre from the surface began
in earnest.

By the summer of 1952 a tent town to
accommodate Cassiar’s two hundred and fifty
pioneer miners and construction men had been
erected. One year later the company ’s first
production mill was placed in operation, milling ore
at its rated capacity of 500 tons per day. Since those

early times the capacity of the mill has progressively
increased. It now processes more than 4,000 tons of
ore per day, producing an average of 415 tons of
asbestos every twenty-four hours.

Currently, Cassiar Asbestos Corporation
Limited has an annual production of more than one
hundred and eight thousand tons of fibre which is
regarded as among the best obtainable anywhere in
the world.

Despite Money’s expressed optimism,
twenty-eight years would pass before Richard
Victor Sittler and three partners, Hiram Nelson,
and the two Kirk brothers, Ronald and Robert,
climbed McDame mountain in 1950 and staked it.
This was the event that generated interest in the
McDame mountain asbestos deposit, leading to the
formation of Cassiar Asbestos Corporation in 1951]
by Conwest Exploration Company of Toronto. This
was the start of 20th century life and industry in the
Cassiar region — Antone Money’ s “isolated corner
of wilderness.”

- CASSIAR GOLD RUSH —

The prospect of quick riches lured
hundreds of placer miners to the
Cassiar, where old was discovered