All One River GIS

In a message dated 1/5/2008 10:13:16 P.M. Mountain Standard Time, (a friend of mine)@yahoo.com writes:

“Some of you feel guilty about not putting in the effort of maintenance down at the rink. For those of us that do put in the effort — we WANT you to feel guilty. But you can atone for such blatant disregard for the efforts of the few, the proud. Some people propose to buy our love and — it’s for sale. Reach in those pockets and donate to the Penguins! CC&V employees can get matching funds from CC&V! So, you could conceivably get twice the love. It takes over 30 hours per week to properly maintain the ice and we’re just volunteers. Nobody is getting paid. If it snows, then it takes us considerably more time to get the rink ready. If you can’t help physically, then help monetarily. Make the checks out to Victor Penguins (or you can slip me a fin or two). It can be a pretty lonely ice floe out there…

Gary Horton
Environmental Coordinator
AngloGold Ashanti (Colorado) Corp. “

That is a message from the President of the Victor Penguin Hockey Club to fellow Penguins. Victor, Colorado has a man-made (made by men we know) outdoors ice rink. It’s not regulation size and until they worked the quirks out, it was lumpy and bumpy as any open lot flooded by a fire hydrant hose in the winter would be.

They tried to get grants. They tried to get a roof (currently, they hang agricultural irrigation netting from cables across the rink to keep shade on the premise as long as possible.) For a while, certain locals and even the MAYOR were totally against the rink mostly because people don’t like change, don’t like dogs or kids and mostly, don’t like to be left out. Brian Hayes, a life-long underground miner who raised his family and now grandkids by working underground first in Leadville and then in Victor (he and Gary were miners at the Ajax Mine until it closed in 1985. Now, Brian works underground at the Gold States Mine on Tenderfoot Hill in Cripple Creek. Most people think CC&V - Anglo - is the only mine operating in the district, which it is not….) Brian Hayes (for whom the rink is named: “Brian’s Park”) fought battles against city hall (literally) until they also got behind the growing momentum to support and utilize the facility for citywide youth recreation.

Victor Penguins Hockey Club is for the local kids. No one has to pay, which is a good thing because the kids in Victor are, well, a wee-bit out of the mainstream. There’s not much to do for wholesome goodness if you’re a kid in Victor. The Penguins Hockey Club provides skates, gear, hot dogs and most importantly - something to do. You just show up.

Eventually, this loose affiliation of miners, kids, wives and other denizens of Victor became endorsed by the City of Victor with Mayor Serena Bielz. All of the sudden Penguins were selling T-shirts and hoodies at Donkey Derby and Gold Rush Days. I made a digital logo for them out of a nearly pirated hand-drawn version handed to me on a folded piece of paper. It was unique enough not to get sued by the professional Penguins. Just to be sure I tweaked it a little more.

At the end of winter Penguins have to take the nets down and at end of summer Penguins put them back up. It’s a major pain-in-the-ass task - ladders, scaffolding, ratchets and nuts-n-bolts, ladies and kids sewing up the big ragged holes with thick line and fat needles. I think Gary’s email list includes nagging about 80 people who are in some way, a Penguin or at the least — a Penguin fan.

In another email Gary writes,

“I need to change Nets Day to May 6th instead of the 5th. The annual Down Phantom - Up Shelf Road Race is the 5th. It’s a 66-mile bike ride loop on the Gold Belt Tour. We’ll have transportation in Canon City if folks just want to do the Down Phantom section and sag support for the Up Shelf portion. No one will die and the downhill is fun. Let me know who’s interested!!”

(*NOTE: Phantom is a narrow dirt road that used to be a narrow-gauge railroad bed from Cripple Creek historic mining district to the smelters in Florence and Canon City. Shelf road is another one of these narrow-gauge railroad beds turned roadway in parallel canyons that many of today’s miners in Cripple Creek commute daily. It is a precarious but spectacularly beautiful drive any time of year.)

Another missive:

“Required Bored Meeting 6/7/07 at Brian’s House. 5:30 a.m.
“Agenda:
501c3 is done and ready for submittal
Those on the board that want to bail before that need to speak up and be replaced
Election of Ron Shutts president (just kidding)
Donkey Derby Days booths
Meeting limited to 1 hour so new topics need to be brief and to the point (cuz I’m president and don’t like long meetings)
If you have concerns and you can’t make it email me and I will respond.
(Just kidding about the am time — it’s really p.m.)
– Gary Horton”

Bison Reservoir is also nearby. Sometimes the Penguins go to Bison for fishing and sometimes the Penguins go to Donkey Days for hoodies… sometimes a Penguin catches a trout at Bison after having a hot dog at Donkey days… Sometimes Gary addresses the clan as “Penguin Nation”…and of course, there are peewee Penguins, also.

Every year, the Penguins have an auction to raise funds. We often buy hundreds of dollars worth of whirly-gigs, T-shirts, bar mirrors, household stuff, and restaurant coupons. The auction is always at “Ralf’s” which is a bar that serves Rosemary’s Pizza - Rosemary is Brian Haye’s wife (and another Penguin…)

I don’t know if I am a Penguin or not because there is a loose class of actual teams, one of which has jerseys. There is a “cup” (The Victor Cup), which is a tin miners cup that used to belong to Brian. It’s nailed to a board. Victor Cup Days is the only day they keep score. Mostly, though, anyone can come and skate. There is a shed full of used skates, pads, helmets and sticks. I own my own equipment and have “played” a couple of times (if that’s what you call skating around in a stiff posture with a stick in hand trying to get in people’s way…) Maybe I’m a semi-Penguin, having once made a goal and once skated at high-velocity face-first into the equally momentum-propelled Exploration Manager, Tim Brown. I would be dead for that if I weren’t wearing a helmet. The sound of the concussion brought people running to see what happened. I also wear my horses’ ankle guards on my elbows.

It’s all about the kids. And mining. And community in a little old, historic mining town in the mountains: Victor Penguins.

“Ivory Coast’s disarmament begins”

Rebels and government forces in Ivory Coast have begun the process of disarmament more than five years after the country descended into violence.

The man who sent this article to me is an attorney who specializes in mining matters in such interesting places as Togo, Nigeria, Niger, Waggi (Ouagadougou to you), Winnipeg, and La Côte d’Ivoire, which is where I met him. He sent this article to me as fodder to see what I would do with it. He knows that I can read between the lines of compiled facts.

For example, I know that within one region of Africa, people might be sipping on frappe or cappuccino and in the same region, persons might me strapping flattened plastic litter bottles to their feet to use as footwear. Between many of the regions, there are also big camo-military guys with AK-47s and you must get used to this if you are to go, say, to the beach or visit your friend, or teach cartography in Abidjan. The world isn’t such a crazy place but the people in it are a little whacky.

I call this man Brawk, because he was once duped by a chicken murmuring his name, but that is another story…

The people in Cotes d’Ivoire were colonialized by the French and that saveur d’française remains in the culture, though the love of French guys is way long gone. That might be because the French remain on the premise despite the country’s independence. The French are “seemingly” (hey - I calls ‘em as I sees ‘em. It looks like something we - -the United States — would do. Not nice French guys…) unofficially occupying Cotes d’Ivoire (observation: the French military are there), which I personally don’t mind but the Ivoirians do. That, and the French army bombed the entire CDI airforce — which was only one aircraft sans pilot - but the Ivoirians were planning on getting a pilot really soon (on the top of their “must-do” list) right before the French went and blew the plane up. There was (probably still is) a black hole in the runway of the airport when I was there, where the CDI had parked their “airforce”.

The reason the Chicken-Whisperer sent this article to me was because I once saved our lives with a sock puppet at the border of Cotes d’Ivoire and Ghana. I belive that one of the base level criteria for mankind is mining - kidding - that a common criteria for humanity is a form of mutual brotherhood and that quality includes the ability to laugh at ourselves and each other. So, when big military guys with AK-47s and quite stern intentions surrounded this international attorney of complicated mining affairs and one other big guy trying to protect us all (moi avec mon collègue), I made a sock puppet and began to speak French out the car window to them, though I do not speak French. I used a pocket dictionary and communicated to the throng that my poor buddies had a lot more to deal with than the political instability du jour and disintegrating border relationships - they had: me and I am crazy geo woman with a sock puppet and please let us go.

It worked. For that day and in that moment, making people laugh worked in a rough situation. And THAT is why he sent this article to me. People are people are people all over the world and even in politically unstable situations, there is SOMETIMES an element of humanity that wants to come out, that wants to have a better day. I don’t think I would recommend using a sock puppet in the face of danger all the time, but it worked for me.

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Yesterday, the Colorado Mining Association held its 2007 St. Barbara’s Day Celebration. In addition to observing the patron saint of mining, the event also recognized the outstanding life-time contributions to Colorado mining by Stanley Dempsey – underground miner / geologist gone corporate: lawyer, executive, and investment banker. Mr. Dempsey accepted this award with quiet pride. He seemed a humble man and those around him were obviously respectful.

The room was filled with a diverse spectrum of handsome white-haired old guys and lovely women. Diane Dudley, (Co-Chair of the Denver Mining Club), and I, were both pleasantly surprised to see young people there! Where did they come from?

Some of the hot topics included, of course, Freeport-McMoRan’s announcement the Climax Molybdenum mine will be reopening — General Manager, Jim Arnold, was there with his lovely wife, Laurie – the latter told us of her involvement with Women in Mining when they used to live in Nevada.

Other interesting attendants included Anne Weber – another geo gone lawyer. Her land status business was one of many “support-type” services represented at the event. Vivien Hui and her friend, Karen, from RCAI, whose company manufactures a non-stick coating for mining processes, are also Ragged Ass Miners. Jim Murray, President of Arrakis engineering firm, helped me undercut a chocolate cake while Paul Gates, from Marston evaluated the structural damage.

Afterward, Diane and I agreed it is so nice to relax in the safe haven of a mining event, surrounded by reasonable mining people, than to be on guard about our passion: the mining industry at other events.

I learned a while ago, the hard way, that being a company man isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. The bottom line is get-what-you-want. That may mean telling (in polite terms) your boss how much money you need to do the job. That may mean eating crow and being nice to guys who took advantage of you or your buddy in order to “self-promote” and secure the better job. In some cases, being a company man, simply means trying to keep your mind challenged, and keeping a healthy attitude because it is easier to get up, drive to the office and actually get out of the car and go in if you have something to look forward to that day.

In Ghana, I learned that a small investment of time, in the way of providing a refresher course in cartography for example, went a long way with the staff further than perhaps a financial bonus might have reached. When the bosses make a special day for the staff, and someone from corporate actually sits down at their computers, at their desk, drinks from the office coffee pot out of their assorted stained coffee cups and spends the whole day with them looking at what they do for a living, then the time invested with them hands-on rekindles embers of what used to be motivation and ambition, seemingly dead, left over all these years from days when they were young geologists and engineers studying in college.

Everyone wants to be recognized and appreciated for their contribution. In Africa, they also want a letter with your signature in their personnel file stating you have reviewed their contributions and they want a laminated, signed certificate to document that they made it – they have accomplished the tasks asked of them to company standards. The result goes a long way.