Company Performance Metrics
The Pickle Crow Gold Mine was famous in its heyday, and remains well known in the industry today. It was among the highest grade, longest-lived underground gold mines in North America, operating continuously from April 23rd, 1935 through September, 1966 and producing in total 45 tonnes (1,446,214 Troy oz.) of gold and about 5.25 tonnes (168,757
Troy oz.) of silver from 2,785,488 tonnes (3,070,475 tons) of ore milled. Average recovered grade over the life of the mine was 16.14 g/t Au (0.47 oz/T Au) and 1.88 g/t Ag (0.06 oz/T Ag).
The mine established a Canadian record by paying a dividend to its shareholders a mere 11 months after beginning production. In its first year the mine earned $415,962 (equivalent to about $6.5 million 2007 US$) after taxes and continued to earn substantial profits through World War II, labour shortages and constantly declining real gold prices (adjusted for inflation), for 28 consecutive years. In the post-war years, under the stewardship of Dr. Norman B. Keevil, then President of PCGM, these profits from the Pickle Crow Mine partially underwrote the growth of another great Canadian mining success story, Teck Corporation (now Teck Cominco). This outstanding record of profitability reflected in part the consistently high grades of the veins being mined, and their excellent persistence and continuity, particularly in the depth dimension.
