Bralorne pours first dor bar from historic BC gold mine

Seventy-nine years after the first gold brick was poured from one of British Columbia’s richest and largest gold mines, Bralorne Gold Mines (BPM-V) has restarted operations at the Bralorne complex. The company poured the first gold-silver doré bar from its fully operating 120-ton-per-day mill at an opening ceremony held on May 27.

Containing 254 oz. gold and 59 oz. silver, the bar is worth approximately $383,000 at today’s high metals prices – much more than the $6,217 original brick containing 363 oz. gold was worth, back in 1932.

The Bralorne complex is a five-hour, 322 km drive north of Vancouver, near the small town of Gold Bridge. The complex includes a 25-sq.-km land package spanning three major historic gold mines in the area: Bralorne, Pioneer and King.

Though the Bralorne camp shut down operations in 1971 because of low gold prices, it produced nearly 4 million oz. gold during its lifetime and supported a town of 10,000 people at its peak. 

Bralorne the company is now working its way through a 14,000-ton surface stockpile of ore with an average grade of 0.368 oz. gold per ton (or 12.6 grams gold per tonne), followed by an even higher grade 11,200-ton underground stockpile at 0.464 oz. gold (or 15.9 grams gold) from the BK stope.

The plan is to mine and explore new mineralization in gap areas between the historic mines, with two significant discoveries made in recent years: the BK vein, a high-grade zone located between the Bralorne mine and the King mine, and the BP Gap zone, located between Bralorne and the Pioneer mine.

The mine’s reopening is the culmination of several decades’ work for 78-year-old Louis Wolfin, who retired as chairman of the company in November 2010. The long-time stockbroker and mining executive nevertheless remains close by: his long-time business associate William Kocken, 80, runs the company as president and CEO, while his son David Wolfin acts as vice-president.

Wolfin Sr. first explored Bralorne in the late 1950s with Ace Mining. Ace Mining operates today under the name Avino Silver & Gold Mines (ASM-V), a Mexico-focused miner which features son David as its president. After the Bralorne mines shut down, Wolfin returned to the area in the 1970s with several companies under his control, including Coral Gold (CLH-V) and Levon Resources (LVN-V). He eventually consolidated all their interests into Avino in the late 1980s. Avino discovered significant gold mineralization in 1990 on its Loco property, next to the Bralorne mine. By 1991 the company acquired 100% control of all the mines and exploration properties in the Bralorne camp. The next year it announced plans to re-open the mine at a production rate between 300 to 400 tonnes per day. 

A downturn in the markets led Avino to option a 50% interest in the project in 1995 to then-dormant Bralorne-Pioneer Gold Mines, also controlled by Wolfin, but the pair failed to get the operation off the ground before the price of gold collapsed below $300 per oz. in the early 2000s.

Bralorne-Pioneer acquired the entire interest in 2002. By 2004, after changing names to Bralorne Gold Mines and rolling back shares 1-for-10, the company started bulk sampling to test the feasibility of full-scale mining. Technically, the company poured its first doré bar from Bralorne in April 2004, in conjunction with the bulk sampling program. Investors have waited patiently for the mine to reopen ever since, despite several successful rounds of exploration, advanced geophysical surveys and the completion of many underground drifts.

It was not until 2009 that the company found an affluent backer with the funds necessary to move Bralorne back into production. Maxwell Munday, a real estate developer from Burnaby, B.C., and a prolific investor in junior mining stocks, has acquired 9.5 million shares of the company over the last few years in several private placements. He now controls approximately 33.9% of Bralorne’s 28.4 million issued and outstanding common shares, mostly through his private company, Munday Home Sales, and a not-for-profit Christian organization set up with his wife, the Munday-Maxwell & Gaylene Association.

Bralorne’s financial statements are not quick to disclose how much gold the company plans to produce each year from its operations. But they do caution readers that the mine “is being operated on a trial basis initially.” 

A feasibility study has not been completed. The company states that “viable operating and financial projections were made in a preliminary economic assessment by Beacon Hill Consultants in 2005, which was updated in 2007 based on a gold price of $600 per oz. and a milling rate of 280 tons per day.” The mill is now run at a rate of 100 tons per day in order to “assess the economic parameters and potential viability of the operation at the current gold price.”

On June 16, the thinly-traded shares of Bralorne closed down 4¢ to $1.31 on volume of 1,000 shares. The stock has a 52-week range of 90¢ to $1.56.