Cobalt ftes centenary of silver discovery

More than 5,000 visitors recently converged on Cobalt, Ont., to celebrate the centenary of the discovery of silver there.

As part of the celebrations, the Cobalt mining district was declared a national historic site in a ceremony attended by Benot Serr, member of Parliament for Timiskaming-Conchrane. Serr unveiled a plaque which he said “illustrates the important contribution the development of northern Ontario played in the growth of our country as a whole.”

Other highlights included a 2-mile-long parade, a poetry contest, a soap-box derby, and a slow-pitch tournament.

Silver was discovered in Cobalt in 1903, when, according to legend, blacksmith Fred LaRose threw a hammer at a fox and uncovered the first of many rich veins of mineralization. The town received its name the following year, when cobalt was discovered along with the silver. The area has produced an estimated $300 million in silver.

During the recent celebrations, the town’s arena was renamed the Les Costello Memorial Arena in honour of the former Toronto Maple Leafs hockey player who quit hockey in 1950 to become a Roman Catholic priest. Costello (1928-2002) was born in South Porcupine, an urban centre in the city of Timmins.

The Cobalt Mining Museum unveiled two pieces, on loan from the Ontario government, to help mark the centenary: the Silver Lady, a sculpture crafted in 1914 from a bar of silver produced by Cobalt’s Nipissing Mining Co., and the Trethewey Platter, fashioned in 1914 to commemorate the discovery of the Trethewey mine in 1904. The total value of the pieces is estimated to be $55,000.

Bernard Tucker and Dorothy Farmiloe were co-winners of the poetry contest.