(Jane Gaffin extracted information for this article from Dr. Aaro Aho's History of Keno Hill Mining District. This story includes names of six prospectors who were inducted into the Prospectors' Hall of Fame in 1988.)

Clem Sinyard was a rangy, dark, angular-faced, illiterate Newfoundlander, who was likened to the classical stampeder. He had come to the Yukon in 1899 with a construction crew working on the White Pass Railroad and found his way into the Keno Hill mining district.

Sinyard built a 10 x 12-foot log cabin with a tent-frame roof near timberline on Galena Hill. Passers-by often stopped in to see him. One day, Charlie Brefalt (Hall of Fame) was hiking the hills. Before he reached Sinyard's cabin, his sharp, blue eyes caught sight of some float. He picked up a hatful of rusty manganiferous siderite. He then continued on to his nearby Elsa claim.

Brefalt went to see Howard (Harry) Colley (Hall of Fame), a prominent, scholarly, well-educated prospector who had come to the Yukon in 1921. Colley was born in Richmond, New South Wales, Australia, in 1888. He had taken mining engineering at the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa and had taught school. Colley was prospecting a claim next to Brefalt's Elsa, so it was convenient for the Swede to tell him about the float.

Colley went up and poked around until he found the float. After several days, he learned the ground had not been staked. Colley and his partner Harry McCrimmon had Joe Walsh (Hall of Fame) stake the claim on April 27, 1920. For some reason, McCrimmon chose "Calumet", an ostensible namesake of the great native copper mines in Michigan.

Colley offered a quarter interest to Brefalt, who was too busy slaving on his Elsa property to take on an additional prospect.

Later, about 1932, Colley and Tom McKay (Hall of Fame) sank a prospect hole and struck a vein on the east end. They found the tell-tale rusty siderite.

Colley took a partner to prospect the claim. Don Morrison, a Scottish sailor turned prospector, was not impressed by the section where Colley had been digging. Morrison began sinking holes in a new location.

On March 29, 1934, Alfred Schellinger (Honour Roll), a geologist and mining engineer, and his son Ken stopped by to see Harry Colley, Don Morrison and Tom McKay who had built a small cabin their Calumet claim. The Schellingers stayed for lunch, then carried on to see Clem Sinyard who was sinking holes on his nearby Jock claim.

Returning a couple of hours later, the Schellingers found that Don Morrison had hit bedrock on the Calumet. He was rejoicing in the bluish glitter as he broke open heavy chunks of galena.

Clem Sinyard heard the news and went over to the Calumet. Schellinger could see that the vein was probably offset by a fault. He and Sinyard went back to trace the rough strike of the extension onto the Hector claim.

Sinyard, who had been discouraged with results on the Jock claim, moved down into a draw to dig on the Hector claim he had staked on July 21, 1920.

He found siderite float and traced it to its source in the buried vein where he was encouraged by values reaching up to 312 ounces/ton of silver. Sinyard's financial backer was Malcolm McCowan, a big, jovial man nicknamed "Soapy" because he made deliveries for the laundry.

Meanwhile, Colley and Morrison, excited by their Calumet discovery, began to mine out the few tons of high-grade ore. The vein soon pinched out like so many other prospects in the area. A deeper shaft and more holes were to no avail.

Sinyard had not found any Hector ore, either. Once again it seemed to be just a flash in the pan like the glint of mica that promises gold but betrays.

Jack "Doc" Boon (Hall of Fame), a native of Cornwall and originally a schooner sailor, was a big, hard-working, rambuctious, semi-literate man. He was called "Doc" supposedly for assisting in delivering an Indian woman's baby while he struggled to read an instruction book.

Boon was reputed as an exceptionally fine miner in the Keno Mining district. He had worked for Colley before and boasted that he could find the Calumet ore. If he could deliver on his promise, Colley and Morrison offered to pay Boon a bonus. In the spring of 1935, Boon dug pit after pit until Colley and Morrison told Boon they couldn't afford to pay him any longer.

Boon didn't want to quit. He had pinpointed a spot where he wanted to finish one more hole. He mucked out the last thawed ground in the shallow overburden and struck the ore-laced vein that yielded 326 tons.

Under the pits that Morrison and Boon had dug and under the sorry-looking holes in which Sinyard had sweated, lay a great branching fissure zone that had rifted the hard central quartzite of the Calumet claim. It forked against the Hector fault that crossed its path and rejoined it again in three branches on Sinyard's Hector claim.

Rich ore solutions had flooded and veined the fissures. Hidden deep in the frozen rock was over a hundred million dollars' worth of rich ore which was destined to become Treadwell Yukon's manna. The Hector-Calumet was still being discovered when silver rose to 64 cents an ounce in the spring of 1935.

John Scott, a young mining engineer fresh from the University of Washington, had applied for a job with Treadwell Yukon. Scott's first job with general manager Livingstone Wernecke (Honour Roll) was to assist in examining the new discovery on the Calumet.

Wernecke, a mining engineer, had descended into the hole on the Calumet and emerged saying he would buy it. He reached a conditional agreement with the owners based on assay results. Wernecke then returned to take care of company business in San Francisco.

Scott sampled the Calumet, Sinyard's shaft on the Hector and Brefalt's shaft on the No Cash. Scott crushed the samples and sent them to Wernecke for assaying. Soon, papers arrived for signatures and Colley and Morrison received their 10 percent down payment.

Finally, Sinyard struck the Hector vein at the bottom of a small, 15-foot deep shaft in talus on the north slope below his cabin. He uncovered three to four feet of massive high-grade material and hired men to help. The vein widened. He had fortuitously found this veritable bonanza when silver was at a peak price.

The Hector lay over the widest and richest of the ore bodies. He optioned it to Wernecke for $200,000, although his partner, "Soapy" McCowan, did not sign a "tight agreement" because of difficulties with his wife.

Sinyard went wild with his money and started dressing fashionably and flashy. But his ostentation drew attention from big city con artists who were only too happy to help relieve him of his wealth.

Treadwell only operated the Hector mine a couple of years. The option on McCowan's half interest had led to trouble when the owner died. He had bequeathed his worldly goods to his sister. His former wife in California tied up the estate with a lawsuit. Treadwell dropped McCowan's half interest in 1937 when the former Mrs. McCowan obtained a court judgement against it.

Treadwell still held the option on Sinyard's half interest. But, without a deal on McCowan's half, the only alternative was to start fresh workings on the adjoining Calumet. The camp name was changed accordingly.

Treadwell Yukon went bankrupt in 1941. Suspension of all operations was due to a combination of exhaustion of known ore bodies, lack of sufficient working capital, and uncertain operating and marketing position brought on by the Second World War.

In November of 1945, Keno Hill Mining Company Limited was formed around the old Treadwell workings. The new company was financed by Thayer Lindsay's Frobisher Exploration Co. Ltd. and Fred Connell's Conwest Exploration Ltd.

Sinyard had mined the Hector after Treadwell Yukon was shut down. But he had exhausted both his ore and cash and needed an infusion from Keno Hill Mining.

Fred Connell went to San Francisco to see the former Mrs. McCowan, who was a competent secretary to a judge. Connell succeeded in purchasing her half interest for $100,000 U.S. Through a $300,000 deal with Sinyard, Keno Hill Mining's most important acquisition was secured.

Keno Hill Mining owned all buildings, shops, machinery, mill, tramlines and 87 claims of which Elsa, Calumet, and especially the Hector, were the keys to the empire.

Most of the 80-man crew was hired to rehabilitate the Hector-Calumet which was already accessible by an adit that Treadwell Yukon had driven. More geological work and drill testing revealed another good vein on the Hector.

In 1948, Keno Hill Mining was reorganized into United Keno Hill Mines. Its production mainly hinged on the Hector. Minor production was coming from No Cash, Elsa and Calumet. United Keno's position as a major world producer of silver continued to expand.

By the end of 1952, more ore was found on the deeper levels of the Hector-Calumet, thus increasing reserves. By 1953, 625,483 ounces of silver were produced every month. United Keno was Canada' second largest silver camp and the world's fourth largest, according to Dr. Aaro Aho's historical account.

The combo Hector-Calumet proved to be a real bonanza. But Clem Sinyard didn't live to see the ultimate results of his discovery. He had died in 1949.

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See related article: Charlie Brefalt: Discoverer of the Elsa--the Jewel in Treadwell Yukon's Crown.