Gilbert A. LaBine, (10 February 1890 – 8 June 1977) was a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

prospector Prospector may refer to: Space exploration * Prospector (spacecraft), a planned lunar probe, canceled in 1962 * '' Lunar Prospector'', a NASA spacecraft Trains * Prospector (train), a passenger train operated by the Denver & Rio Grande Western ...

who, in 1930, discovered

radium Radium is a chemical element with the symbol Ra and atomic number 88. It is the sixth element in group 2 of the periodic table, also known as the alkaline earth metals. Pure radium is silvery-white, but it readily reacts with nitrogen (rathe ...

and

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

deposits at

Port Radium Port Radium is a mining area on the eastern shore of Great Bear Lake, Northwest Territories, Canada. It included the settlement of Cameron Bay as well as the Eldorado (also called Port Radium) and Echo Bay mines. The name Port Radium did n ...

, Northwest Territories. He has become known as the father of

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

's uranium industry. LaBine was president of

Eldorado Gold Mines Eldorado Resources was a Canadian mining company active between 1926 and 1988. The company was originally established by brothers Charles and Gilbert LaBine as a gold mining enterprise in 1926, but transitioned to focus on radium in the 1930s a ...

(later Eldorado Mining and Refining) from its start in the late 1920s to 1947. He left the company, which had become a Crown corporation in 1944, to prospect for uranium minerals as an independent mine developer. In the 1950s he brought the

Gunnar Mine __NOTOC__ The Gunnar Mine was a uranium mine in northern Saskatchewan, Canada located around southwest of the community of Uranium City, and approximately 600 km north of Saskatoon. The mine was situated on the Crackingstone Peninsula on th ...

to production at

Uranium City, Saskatchewan Uranium City is a northern settlement in Saskatchewan, Canada. Located on the northern shores of Lake Athabasca near the border of the Northwest Territories, it is above sea level. The settlement is northwest of Prince Albert, northeast of ...

Early life and education

Adelard "Gilbert" LaBine was born on a farm at Westmeath Township,

Renfrew County Renfrew County is a county in the Canadian province of Ontario. It stands on the west bank of the Ottawa River. There are 17 municipalities in the county. History Bathurst District When Carleton County was withdrawn from Bathurst District in 1 ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

, on 10 February 1890. He studied at the Haileybury Provincial School of Mines.

Career

Discovery

LaBine made his first prospecting strike "in some silver claims near Cobalt" in the

Ottawa Valley The Ottawa Valley is the valley of the Ottawa River, along the boundary between Eastern Ontario and the Outaouais, Quebec, Canada. The valley is the transition between the Saint Lawrence Lowlands and the Canadian Shield. Because of the surroun ...

. He incorporated his own company in 1926 under the name "Eldorado Gold Mines, Limited". At the end of March 1930, LaBine traveled to

Great Bear Lake Great Bear Lake ( den, Sahtú; french: Grand lac de l'Ours) is a lake in the boreal forest of Canada. It is the largest lake entirely in Canada (Lake Superior and Lake Huron are larger but straddle the Canada–US border), the fourth-largest ...

in the Northwest Territories to do some prospecting. On 16 May, while exploring an island at Echo Bay, LaBine discovered "a very rich deposit of uranium ore". LaBine stockpiled uranium ore at Great Bear Lake from the time of early production after the staking of the company's first two claims in May 1930. Eldorado's pitchblende (the outcrop of rock containing uranium, cobalt, radium, silver etc.) was refined initially for radium because it traded at a high value and was used for treating cancer. Uranium was a by-product of the refining process, and the company had little use for it. When radium prices dropped, operations slowed down. "By mid-1940, Eldorado's sales totaled less than $8 million and its prospects were not encouraging ... In July, the mine was shut down and allowed to fill with water."

War effort and awards

By 1944 Canadian Munitions and Supply Minister C. D. Howe had purchased a controlling interest in and expropriated Eldorado Mining Company. Howe authorized LaBine, Eldorado's president, to begin buying the company's stock in secret. Howe considered LaBine to be both a personal friend and a good manager, assuring the British government that he "could be left in control of the company". According to Peter C. Newman's analysis, financing could not have come from investors, "who would have had to be kept in ignorance of the project's significance". The government had the mine immediately "drained and cemented ... and employed prospectors to search for additional uranium deposits". The miners hired to reopen Eldorado were screened by the RCMP and sworn to secrecy. Given this notion it seems secrecy was conducted the same way uranium contracts had been allocated; efficiency and development of an atomic weapon took precedence over political concerns like communist attitude amongst the workforce or homage to Britain. According to historian Robert Bothwell, Howe concluded that the issue over Canadian uranium was "of extreme, and permanent, importance. If Eldorado were seized using the government's emergency powers, the company would revert to its original ownership and control when the war emergency lapsed." Because Eldorado was purchased outside the scope of the

War Measures Act The ''War Measures Act'' (french: Loi sur les mesures de guerre; 5 George V, Chap. 2) was a statute of the Parliament of Canada that provided for the declaration of war, invasion, or insurrection, and the types of emergency measures that could t ...

, Canada remained in control of the mine after the war had ended. Howe left discretionary power in the hands of LaBine, who continued on as manager. LaBine was kept on as Eldorado president until 1947 and made "an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for his war work". LaBine was inducted as an Officer of the

Order of Canada The Order of Canada (french: Ordre du Canada; abbreviated as OC) is a Canadian state order and the second-highest honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the cen ...

on 27 June 1969 in recognition of "his varied contributions to the mining industry in Canada", his last official recognition before his death. He was posthumously inducted into the

Canadian Mining Hall of Fame The Canadian Mining Hall of Fame was conceived by Maurice R. Brown as a way to honor Canada's mine finders and builders, in recognition of accomplishments by leaders in the Canadian mining industry. The Hall was established in 1988; in 2022 it ha ...

in 1989. The

Northern Transportation Company Marine Transportation Services (MTS) formerly Northern Transportation Company Limited (NTCL) is a marine transportation company operating primarily in the Mackenzie River watershed of the Northwest Territories and northern Alberta, and the Arc ...

named the

tugboat A tugboat or tug is a marine vessel that manoeuvres other vessels by pushing or pulling them, with direct contact or a tow line. These boats typically tug ships in circumstances where they cannot or should not move under their own power, su ...

Radium Gilbert The ''Radium Gilbert'' was a tugboat built for transporting supplies to, and ore from, the radium and uranium mines in Canada's Northwest Territories. Like the other tugs in the Radium Line she was steel-hulled. She was named after Gilbert La ...

'' after Labine. She spent her operational career carrying ore and supplies on

References

External links

Canadian Mining Hall of Fame biography

Gilbert LaBine
at

The Canadian Encyclopedia ''The Canadian Encyclopedia'' (TCE; french: L'Encyclopédie canadienne) is the national encyclopedia of Canada, published online by the Toronto-based historical organization Historica Canada, with the support of Canadian Heritage. Available f ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:LaBine, Gilbert 1890 births 1977 deaths Officers of the Order of Canada Canadian prospectors Uranium City, Saskatchewan Canadian mining businesspeople Canadian gold prospectors People from Renfrew County