CIM pays homage to legendary editor of The Northern Miner

For his 43 years of reporting at The Northern Miner, M.R. (Mort) Brown will receive a lifetime achievement award.

The presentation will be made at the Journalism Awards ceremony during the annual general meeting of the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (CIM), to be held April 28-May 2 in Edmonton, Alta.

Brown was born in Port Arthur (now Thunder Bay), Ont., in 1912. He graduated from the University of Toronto with a B.Sc. in mining engineering in 1938.

During his final year, as president of the school’s mining and metallurgical society, he invited a writer from The Northern Miner to speak to students.

The speaker aroused in Brown such a sense of excitement in the industry that he vowed to join The Miner’s editorial staff himself some day.

He did so in 1949, as an engineer-reporter. He later became assistant editor and was appointed editor in 1977, publisher in 1985 and was named publisher emeritus in 1987. He retired at the end of 1992.

During his years at the paper, Brown travelled to every significant mining camp in the country and chronicled every major development, giving him a unique perspective on Canadian mining which he shared with his readers on a weekly basis.

His achievements were not limited to journalism, as he helped establish the Canadian Mining Hall of Fame, where he is still director. In 1993, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame himself.

An enthusiastic supporter of the country’s mining industry, Brown received the Distinguished Service Award from the Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada in 1988.