PARADOX VALLEY, WORLD SOURCE OF RADIUM from a Worthless* Stretch of - Des¬ In the Person of the Ra¬ ert Comes the Basis of dium Prospector the America's GifttoMme. Old West Comes Some Curie, Ore. of the Way Back. One Germany, Before the CarloadofOreBrought War, Nearly Owned It $20,000. It Is the Sun¬ shine yryr 7 HEN Mme. Marie Curie visits ofParadoxValley the United States in and W May wealth through radium than they ever is presented with radium could have made by their orchards. valued at $100.000 from the women of The radium prospector finds his profit in a country it will be an ail- locating carnotite claim and selling this truly out to some American gift which she will receive. one with capital, as it is X estimated that one should hatfe a hold¬ Out in the grim, broken, sage-covered ing of at least twenty-fourclaims before desert whore southern Colorado and The gulches of attempting production. In the earh- Utah meet, there is produced the carno¬ the radium days of the industry prospecting was tite ore from which most of the world's country are generally done in the gulches anfi of radium is recovered. Valua¬ prospected for searching for "bug holes." Carnotite is supply found in colored ble mines have been located in arid carnotite out- light , and it; often crops out in canyons and that were worthless even croppings gulches. gulches for Being so brightly colored it is readily cattle grazing. Concentrating mills have distinguishable. The layers are of vary¬ been erected and little mining settle¬ ing thicknesses. Sometimes a ledge that looks ments have grown up where not even the «¦¦»fcr^Ä promising will yield little courageous "dry farmer" planted his carnotite, and sometimes faint indica¬ tions will lead to a few Burros heavy deposits. On homestakes years ago. one claim mined with sacks of rich radium-bear¬ by government experts leaded for the National Radium Institute sev¬ A rock sentinel ing concentrates pick their way along lonely in western Col¬ eral tons of high grade carnotite were trails to the dusty that orado, showing the rough nature of the found in a soft, claylike mass of black rough highways carnotite reach out into the not less dusty desert. fields ore. Their burdens are shifted to ore wagons Ore Carefully Sorted be necessary to remove from to .one wagon and a trailer to a six-horse twenty According to Grades thirty tons of rock, to get one ton of mill team there is much rat¬ After the ore has been usually.and ore. Also it is easy to miss a body of ore found and tling of tires and cracking of whips and in drilling. Consequently much mined there comes the work of sorting. capital The ore is flinging of oaths as the teamsters jolt is required, and that is the reason why carefully separated into most of the grades. The high grade is put into sacks their way to the nearest railway st«t- holdings in the district are for drifting into the hands of one or transporting to the railroad. The tion, perhaps fifty or seventy-five miles two low large concerns. grade is sent to the mill for con¬ distant. centrating. One man can sack from Dust-Proof 75 Machinery to 80 sacks of high grade ore in a Sacks of Ore Yield To The day. Pin-Point of Radium Stop Leakage sorting must be done by daylight, In prospecting for carnotite ore, a as it is difficult to distinguish the coloi At the railroad the sacks of canary- of good idea of the radium content can be the ore by artificial light. Only the have been sorted from most colored ore, which obtained by use of photographic plates. experienced men are utilized as countless tons of worthless or low grade By putting the ore in contact with a sorters. surrounding rock, are shipped to a re¬ plate, outside the slide holder, and leav¬ Names of claims in the carnotite min¬ duction plant in the East.Mme. Curie ing it there several hours, fog will be ing fields are reminiscent of the namef discernible on the plate in to in the oldtime gold is to visit one at Pittsburgh, according proportion mining camps the radium content of the ore. There is a hint of adventure in sue) to dispatches.and, through a long and Scientific instruments have been de¬ names as the Maggie C, Dixie much set¬ Paradox in Medea, expensive process, involving Valley southwestern Col¬ veloped for ascertaining the radium con¬ Vanadite, Buckeye, Montana, Urani; tling in tanks, the precious element is orado, where are found the richest de¬ tent more accurately, but the photo¬ and Henry Clay. secured, pin-point by pin-point. posits of radium-bearing carnotite in the graphic record proves practical when The "bug holes," of which mentioi entire world the other is not has been Mme. Curie has expressed a desire to available. made, are carnotite deposit . Wonders have been filling holes in the visit the radium fields, if the trip is pos¬ accomplished in ground several fee Carnotite concentrates in a safe in Colo¬ treating the ore for reduction purposes. deep and from three to five inches i] sible, and also to see the best of Ameri¬ rado, sacked for shipment to Germany, It was found that much of the radium diameter. It has been suggested tha can scenery. Her route will be through which country sought to control the content was escaping in dust in the these "bug holes," which are filled wit; a land of grandeur if she visits the car- radium supply before the war course of reducing the ore. Dust-proof carnotite of the highest hav been grade, notite fields of Colorado. There is only machinery was devised and now such formed by lightning. They are source of no one route to the radium country.the There was much waste at the mines. leakage is stopped. little profit, and are akin t Denver & Rio Grande Railroad out of something which seemed doubly deplor¬ The aim of the prospector, of course, the pockets of ore found in certain mir Denver. Crossing the Continental Di¬ able in view of the apparent limitation is to find a deposit containing the ulti¬ one mate of radium content. A vide at of its sublimest points, after of the production. Those fears have claim which Bureau of Mines Cuts having transferred to the narrowgauge been proved groundless by recent dis¬ yields much high grade ore is equivalent Cost of Production line, Mme. Curie will find herself in the to a fortune. The other day, in Mont- coveries of huge bodies of carnotite ore A and Uncompahgre Valley. Here the govern¬ means of diamond rose, the county seat of Montrose cheap effective reduction proc¬ by drills, enabling ess for carnotite ment has brought water from the Gun- prospectors to make discoveries which County, in which the richest carnotite ore, as compared with claims are a the processes at first in nison River through an amazingly long were hitherto undreamed of. At it found, carload of high vogue, was first ore worked out and costly tunnel, and irrigated fruit was grade brought'$20,000 after spirited by Bureau of Mines experts, prophesied that the carnotite fields with the assistance farms have sprung up where there was would not more bidding by speculators. It was figured of Dr. James yield than a thousand that the of New only sagebrush a matter of fifteen years tons of carnotite which would 2 individual who bought the car Douglas, York City, and Dr. assay of ore would have considerable Howard of ago. As the lower end of the valley ap¬ per cent uranium oxide and 4 per cent margin Kelly, Baltimore, who of profit when his purchase was mar¬ wanted to get radium for proaches the Utah line the desert effect vanadium oxide. As a matter of fact, hospital pur- gets more The is keted. l^ses. The doctors advanced the funds pronounced. country since 1918 there has been mined more and the more broken and the sagebrush is in the than 40,000 tons from the Paradox Big Industries Profit government experts devised the process and erected a at ascendancy. The railroad swings off in field of carnotite ore assaying even From Uranium plant Denver, where $100,000 worth of radium was another direction, Placerville being the higher than the figures mentioned. Yet The uranium content of the carnotite final station. Placerville the produced by the so-called National Ra¬ Beyond it is said on the authority of one of the ore is valuable. Uranium is used in the dium Institute. country has scant visitation of water. now The process then be¬ companies operating in the south¬ manufacture of high grade dyes and also came As it drops away toward the Utah line western Colorado public property. It is estimated field that not over 1 in steel making. Its possibilities, ac¬ that from it becomes and more desert-like in cent June, 1914, when work in the dryer per of the carnotite ore of that cording to experts, are just being un¬ its character. There are few on plant began, to January, 1917, when it trees region has been exhausted. More than derstood. Rich vanadium mines are the and was stopped, eight and one-half hills, occasional erosions of forty freighting outfits are now hauling found in southwestern Colorado, and of grams sandstone rear their The rugged outcroppings of the carnotite radium had been produced at one- heads.^strange country are peculiar to the entire Colo- carnotite ore from the Paradox field to tungsten has been discovered there in third formations which increase in number rado River plateau the railroad. One of the current price. In addition company has spent considerable quantities. In fact, the the process had saved and size as one journeys further out on in this and rare metal the uranium and $4,000,000 field, another resources of the state have vanadium content of the the great plateau that stretches toward richest discoveries of carnotitehave been company has spent over in been ores. the Prospectors who had acquired holdings $1,000,000 only slightly developed. Metals are . made. Some visiting French scientists that seemed certain to the last few years. Hundreds of miners now being found and mined with Radium is also found in pitchblende the bring them riches profit in "wer Fixed Pate investigated strange yellow ore were reduced to penury. Some could and teamsters are employed, and that which meant absolutely nothing to the Gilpiri County/ Colorado, but it is which had been found in the and not much more Of Paradox valley even afford to keep up the necessary disappearing type, the prospector, has prospectors and miners of early days, easily extracted from the Valley discovered that it was radium The bearing, assessment work and lost valuable been revived and new discoveries are who were attracted to the West by the dry, powdery, yellow carnotite hidden vulleys here would be just as rich and named it for the man who was then claims. Others constantly being made in the lure of the gold and silver fields alone. in the rocks and gulches of the as the If could be sold out for what little proved south¬ Uncompahgre they President of France.Carnot. It was they could get. the area which even now extends well over Now one meets prospectors in the field western part of the state. No such watered, but there Is not a Gunnison to Fortunately, Bureau has sup¬ not long after the discovery of the car¬ of Mines was not Also there the state line into Utah. who have made a study of rare metals ply been found in any other part of be harnessed by government engineers notite fields of and asleep. and who talk in the world. One at Colorado, after their were scientists, outside the government Freight Rate Highest terms that would have Colorado county, m every turn in the hills, and water is extent had been determined by Ameri¬ group that has been Greek to the old-time gold hunter. which the Paradox is such a done such notable work In United States valley located, is scarce article in general that it can government scientists, that they in the The Paradox valley itself was devel¬ said to have has to be advancing production of radium, In the first years of carnotite produced seventy-six "packed".Westerners never were overrun with German agents, buy¬ who were alive to the mining oped solely as a fruit country. For grams of radium out of the tote or opportunities that crude methods were as the world carry.for drinking purposes. ing up every claim that promised to be were being presented employed, years it was advertised as one of the supply of one hundred The Paradox to this country business was new and uncertain. Now and five valley, for instance, would of value. Germany was out to dominate by Germany's elimination best fruit valleys in the Far West. Its grams, or about four ounces. We been filled with fruit raisers to¬ from the one finds diamond drills, compressors, sheltered location With the world's radium market. Ores were field. in the mountains radium coming into more general use in day, instead of carnotite if the rock machines and mechanical hoists. seemed to make it miners, sacked and shipped from Colorado di¬ f The Bureau of Mines called attention immune to early and hospitals all over the world, these river had only run the other way. But to the German Freighters are paid 50 cents a ton mile late frosts, and in rectly market. Only the to the need of some better and more for apples, particular, strange deposits of living sunshine in the only stream in the ran the outbreak of the war outgoing freight on concentrates were raised. valley prevented the con¬ economical process for securing the to the successfully But the Colorado have come into short way across, instead of the trol of the radium situation shipped railroad.which is said orchardists who came to Paradox val¬ increasing long by the Ger¬ radium content from the carnotite ores to be the prominence. If radium is to take rank way, which gave the place its paradoxi¬ man influences that were at in highest freight rate paid in ley to specialize in were as one of cal work the of southwestern Colorado and south¬ the United States. apples among the great curative agencies of name and which limited the irriga¬ Colorado carnotite fields. eastern Utah. In the Strictly speaking, the first on the ground when the car¬ the world, it is evident that tion to no feverish hunt for carnotite mining is not a man's notite these Amer¬ small degree. Carnotite mining was quiescent dur¬ grade ore much low "poor discoveries were made, and some ican fields from which ft is high grade of con¬ game." Even after one locates a Mme. Curie's in the Paradox valley that the ing the war. Claims lost all their value. siderable value body of them who managed to hold their gift comes will was being wasted. of carnotite with a diamond drill it hold out the chief hope may claims during the war have gained more to distressed humanity,