Dave Gibson staked his first claim with Ken Pye 36 years ago.
This morning, they staked their last claim together.
At midnight, the traditional process for registering mining claims in Ontario will cease. It’s being replaced by the Mining Lands Administration System and will completed online.
To mark the end of the era, local claim stakers, their family and a few interested residents took part in the Last Post ceremony at Hollinger Park in Timmins.
With four posts in the park, a tag was hammered to each. The participants added their name and prospector’s license number to the first, along with the time that the event started and finished.
“It’s great to see a lot of people here that I recognize and know from being in the industry, it’s really a brethren, it’s a brotherhood that we’ve all been part of for many years and it’s the history of Canada and it’s the history of Ontario, especially Northern Ontario,” said Gibson.
Walking from post to post, the prospectors shared stories of the past, regaling one another with memorable adventures or profitable finds.
While there were a lot of smiles, it was an emotional day as well.
Gibson spent the morning west of Timmins staking a final claim in the soon-to-be old-fashioned way.
“For both of us it was very emotional, it was a very sad moment for us actually, and at the same time I was very happy I got to share this with my longtime friend Ken,” he said, adding that the communities in the area started with prospectors staking claims.
Starting tomorrow (Jan. 9) there is a 90-day period when claim-staking and other transactions will not be allowed.
This month, the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines said claim holders are being sent enrolment packages, which can be used to log onto MLAS and set up a profile.
Stage one of the new system is being introduced Feb. 7, followed by an official launch April 10.
Gibson will be using MLAS, but says he’ll always miss the way he started.
“I found my very first piece of gold the first year I was out staking and it was just a small piece the size of a pencil lead and from there I was just bitten with a passion. It’s just a passion of knowing what’s around the next corner, what’s over the next hill, what’s under the next rock, what’s over the next lake kind of thing,” he said. “And it’s that passion that’s always kept prospectors going and it’s always the belief that the next claim, that might be the one and it might be.”
Having the online system take over also marks a change in history for Gibson.
“We actualize going out in the woods, we went out, we staked claims, we prospected, and we were part of the development and the discoveries of this country and this nation and the virtualization of that now takes away from us actually going and doing it,” he said.
