The Kusko Times

STANDISH O'SULLIVAN, NOTED
PROSPECTOR, HITS ANCHORAGE

(Anchorage Times)

Standish O'Sullivan, one of the hardest and most experienced prospectors ever in the North, with more than thirty years' credit due him for delving into the gravels and bucking hard-rock propositions everywhere from the Yukon to Bering Sea, is in Anchorage from the Willow Creek district, where he was employed for the winter in helping drive the long tunnel on the Gold Top property, under option to Canadian interests. He is renewing acquaintance with many oldtimers here whom he knew in various Northern camps.

With the classic accent of a true son of Erin, but an American since the good old days when Michael Cudahy was the pork king of Chicago and Omaha, and Marcus Daly was referred to by some of the recruits at Butte, Mont., as "president of the United States," O'Sullivan is never forgotten by one who has had the pleasure of meeting him. After being in the Klondike in the gold rush days, he was in Fairbanks, Iditarod, the Kuskokwim, Nome, Candle, Kobuk, Koyukuk and so many other places he has lost the count—and four years ago took a flyer on silver-lead mining in the Mayo district, and where he bought some of the most promising looking claims of that now famous silver camp. His property there is on Galena Hill, and he is marking the time until the silver tide comes back.

In the meantime he is planning to hop away by plane soon for another gold hunt. Leaving Keno City winter before last, O'Sullivan worked a lay on famous old Gold Run creek, in the Klondike, for one winter; and last summer was engaged in hydraulic work on a gold proposition in the Circle district. Late in the fall he went to Fairbanks, and early in the winter started work in the hard rock mines of the Willow district. Now he is planning to get away as soon as the snows are off for a flight of several hundred miles by plane to a point way above the Arctic Circle and easterly from Nome, where he will prospect for gold placers. He has been in that region before, and says he believes the area north of the Arctic Circle is the place for the prospector now to look for virgin placers, and he is just the boy who has the optimism and the grit to follow up his dream. Tall, muscular and hard as nails, he does not let the years which have given his hair a slight touch of gray dampen his determination or hope. In all his years in the North he has not been grubstaked once, and when he hit the country he was broke. In all that time he has financed himself on so many prospecting ventures he has lost the count on the list. How does he do it?

"Well, it's just this way," says Standish. "I will not accept a grubstake. I do not want to be bothered with it. When I am broke I go to work—long enough to get money to buy an outfit, and then I hit the trail again and keep at it until I strike it or run out of supplies. When I fail to hit it I get back to work some place. I cannot afford to be bothered with grubstakers. I have been fortunate in having good health—and am grateful, and hope to be able to keep going for years."