A Geological Chance Encounter: James McLaren Forbes
By Tony Nikischer
Excalibur Mineral Corp.
http://www.mindat.org/article.php/1164/A+Geological+Chance+Encounter%3A+James+McLaren+Forbes
I recently came across two envelopes (see figures 1 and 2) from two different mining companies in the Philippines that were from a “J.M. Forbes”, posted more than seventy (70) years ago about nine (9) months apart in 1939. As is my custom, finding out more about the writer, addressee and the companies involved usually provides some insight into times, personalities and places I can never experience firsthand. What made these two envelopes even more interesting was that both still retained their contents, an unexpected bonus which provided additional clues to the answers I sought. The writer, J.M. Forbes, signed his letters as “Laren”. They were addressed to his mother, Mary R. (Rozette) Forbes in Covina, California.
By way of period background, the Philippines were ceded to the United States by Spain in 1898, along with control over Cuba, Puerto Rico and Guam. The Philippines were subsequently given their independence in 1935, subject to a transition period as a U.S. Commonwealth that was to last until 1946. Note that both envelopes in figures 1 and 2 were franked with the country’s early independence stamps of 1935, subsequently overprinted with “Commonwealth” that accurately reflected both the time and political standing of the country. Comprised of some 7,100 islands and islets in the Malay Archipelago, formal geological study of the Philippines by the USGS began immediately after the Spanish-American war in 1898. In my archive of dusty books, I located George F. Becker’s Report on the Geology of the Philippine Islands, part of the USGS Twenty-First Annual Report of 1899-1900 – Part III. In his report, Becker summarized the findings of coal, copper, gold, argentiferous lead, iron and other ores, as well as the geological features and fossils of the Archipelago.
Becker’s work noted some sixteen (16) villages on the island of Luzon that had moderate quantities of gold, among them Paracale in the Camarines Norte district. And it was here that J. McLaren Forbes toiled for the Paracale-Gumaus Consolidated Mining Company, and later for the North Camarines Gold Mining Company noted in figures 1 and 2. He arrived in the Philippines several years earlier in 1936, fresh from a mining job in Superior, Arizona.
In a typed, onion skin letter dated January 5, 1939, J. McLaren Forbes (hereafter “Laren”) answers his mother’s last two or three letters, evidencing the lengthy time and distance difficulties of communication between the United States and its Philippine Commonwealth back then. An excerpt of the letter follows:
I am using the paper you sent me...and I am glad to hear my boots and pick are on the way. I may need them. I can get movie film over here at about the same price you pay, so you need not send anymore....So you are wondering about my looking for a new job. It arrived this afternoon if I want it. It is a geological job for the International Engineering Corporation, one of the Soriano Companies. Will pay P500.00 a month, and only cost me P75.00 a month for chow instead of P90.00. I think I shall take it. I don’t expect to ever get more than P500.00 from Neilson, and besides, Harshman is coming back in six months. I am afraid that if I take too much interest in mill work, I shall like it better than geology. Harshman will finish at Arizona. All he has to do is get up on the platform and receive his doctors degree. No, My Dear, the Mill Super job did not bring an increase in wages. I am supposed to get a fifty peso increase at the end of three months. I doubt if they remember it, however. I hope to get out of her by the 20th or sooner, as soon as they can get someone to take over.
Laren’s wages as mill superintendant, 500 pesos a month, were equivalent to about US$250 at the time, nearly $3800 in today’s dollars had the peso remained stable. The peso exchange rate was fixed by an act of Congress in 1903 that pegged it a half the value of a U.S. dollar. It remained at that rate until 1949. In current dollars and exchange rates, a Philippine peso is worth a little over two cents to the dollar! In a subsequent handwritten letter on Paracale-Gumas letterhead, Laren further writes to his mother:
Well, I ‘m still at Gumaus. I’ll have to leave on the 1st. whether they have found a new man or not. My boots came. They are very fine, and they fit. The only joker is they are not made of waterproof leather as my others were. Kindly see if you can get me two cans of waterproofing called Vitrol. If you can’t get it in Covina, send for a can of the liquid and a can of the paste shown in the enclosed ad. (see figure 3-Editor)....I think I have made some good friends while I have been here. I never expect to find a more congenial group to work with. If it was not for this #$%@$! geology, I’d stay here.
Nine months later, Laren is now working for the North Camarines Gold Mining Company. He discusses the loss of a light meter, asks his mother how his photographs through the binoculars came out, and makes other observations about the end of his film rolls being spoiled by his “Scotch Instinct” to get the most for his money by trying to use every last bit of each roll, the ends subsequently exposed to light during development. He further remarks that it is fine that his mother is on the trail of a “mule bulletin”. The frequent photography references throughout his letters, and the unfathomable “mule bulletin” remark, open a new avenue of discovery for me, and I subsequently learn a great deal more about Laren’s father, the rather famous photographer, Andrew A. Forbes.
The senior Forbes operated a photo studio, and much of his biographical details can be found in The Journal of California Anthropology (Summer 1975). Details about the senior Forbes were provided by his wife (Laren’ mother) and son, our J. McLaren Forbes. Born in 1862, A.A. Forbes took an early interest in photography, and in 1889, “took historical photos of the "Opening Run" event where 20,000 homesteaders races across the Oklahoma border into "Indian Territory" in a wild dash for free land. These Opening Run photos are now at the University of Oklahoma, and marked a turn in his career. He would be a professional photographer from then on.” (per JCAS as above). After working as an itinerant photographer and amassing many images of local life, Forbes sets up his studio in Bishop, California circa1902. The shop closes in 1916 due to poor health, and A.A. Forbes dies in 1921. His wife apparently continues to run the photo studio after his death, and Laren’s interest in photography is therefore explained. (Mrs. Forbes was still producing items such as calendars and photo postcards as late as 1955 that also used her son’s images as well, and some can occasionally be found on eBay and elsewhere today.)
Among A.A. Forbes’ many images were pictures of the salt tramway over the Inyo Mountains, part of the historic operation from the Trepier Mines. [author's note: not accurate, of course. The Trepier Mine had nothing to do with the Saline Valley Salt Tram, as far as we know]. The tramway, a complex engineering feat in itself, was featured in the American Society of Civil Engineering publication of May, 1917. Some images of the mule trails along the tramway were included in Forbes’ Illustrated Catalog of Forbes Studio, Bishop, Inyo County, California, with the catalog published circa 1914 containing his works from the studio between 1902 and 1914. Today, Forbes’ extensive library of negatives are housed at the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, and the Saline Valley Salt Tram is on the National Register of Historic Places. One of Forbes’ many images of the mining operations shows mules carting salt over the zig-zag path along Inyo Mountains (see Figure 4). [Nope: not what Figure 4 shows. We believe that Figure 4 shows Salt being mule-teamed out of Saline Valley via North Pass some time between 1903 and 1909].
Figure 4: An early A.A. Forbes image of mules hauling salt over the Inyo Mountains in California. Eastern Sierra Museum, Independence, California
And as for the “mule bulletin” reference in Laren’s letter, it is still somewhat of a mystery. It was clear that he read Outdoor Life (reference figure 3) and may have been a Boy Scout as a youth as well. The July, 1926 issue of Boys Life, the Boy Scouts of America publication that still exits today, makes reference to a new publication (Vol.1, No. 1) called the Mule Bulletin, produced by a group of Missouri Lone Scouts. Perhaps the bulletin contained images or articles of interest for Mrs. Forbes and Laren, or perhaps even a place to publish their pictures, but it has turned into a dead end for the moment. Perhaps a reader can shed more light on this little mystery.
During the Japanese invasion of the Philippines in 1941, and after the Commonwealth’s occupation until the end of World War II, the whereabouts and geological career of J. McLaren Forbes are blank spaces. The companies he worked for, however, continued to operate after the war, and the Paracale-Gumaus Consolidated Mining Company was operating at least through 2009. (Their involvement in a labor dispute in the late 1950s lead to a well-documented decision by the Supreme Court of the Republic of the Philippines in 1963.) Modern stock certificates from the company are also seen for sale on occasion.
An interesting anomaly turned up during this brief investigation of the Paracale mining operation, and meteorite and tektite dealers have noted that the region is the primary producer of Philippine tektites on the market! One dealer (www.tektites.co.uk) writes:
Paracale is a gold mining area. The tektites are found as a by-product in the hunt for gold. I am told that all the tektites come from a very close proximity to Paracale and not further afield. I am sure tektites are elsewhere, but the lack of mining means they are not found. According to one contact, the rock (which I understand to be gravels, but really a bit of a mixture and clay-rich in places) is dug out of alluvial deposits. The tektites are then found. The deposits are also worked in the sea at depths I understand to be 15-25ft.
Paracale appears to be the most prolific of tektite sites in the Philippines. Most the Philippinites on the market will have come from this area. It is home to the large Bikolite tektites first found by van Eek and described by Beyer. There is also an abundance of smaller specimens, including perfect biscuits coming from this region. Most have very prominent U-grooves. U-grooves formed by the chemical etching, in the soil, of paper-thin thermal expansion cracks, formed as the tektite re-entered the atmosphere. The U-grooves occur on the anterior and the smooth side is the posterior. Beyond about 90g Biscuits give way to breadcrusts. These are commonly grooved all over and spherical. Above about 350g (gradational) the tektites found are always smooth spheres. Shells, shed from these smooth spheres are also found. It is believed that the largest specimens are the most thermodynamically unstable.
Despite his continuing interest and apparent competence with the camera, Laren continued to work as a consulting geologist. In Fred E. Johnson’s book Hardrock, he notes that Forbes was a close college friend, and apparently their careers crossed several times, as did that of Laren and other mineral notables. Forbes resigned from the Geochemical Society in 1966 for unknown reasons, perhaps the passing of his mother and a move to Nevada, and other notable members of the Society at the time were Michael Fleischer (of Glossary fame), Linus Pauling, and R. M., Denning, all mineral namees as well.
The archives of the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology contain a number of J. McLaren Forbes’ letters during his long career as a consulting geologist, then operating out of several different addresses in Reno, Nevada (both Island Avenue and Mueller Drive addresses were observed from the mid-1960s to late 1970s.) A February, 1966 letter to Hatfield Goudey was an interesting one that I encountered. Goudey was a well known mineral dealer, micromount specialist and mineral namee for goudeyite, and he advertised in various hobby magazines from about 1940 to 1984 as a seller of rare minerals (see figure 5). He died in 1985.
Figure 5: One of Hatfield Goudey’s classy micromount boxes, typical of his offerings in the 1960’s. Author’s collection and image.
At the time of Forbes’ letter to him, Goudey was then working as an economic geologist for American Exploration and Mining Co., based in San Francisco. In that letter, Forbes provided Goudey with an assessment of the claims of the Monitor Mining Company in the Robinson Mining District of White Pine County, Nevada. Numerous other studies were conducted by Forbes for a large number of mining companies, attorneys and fellow geologists in Nevada and California, and his professional documents and paper trail extended at least into1982. His whereabouts and eventual disposition after this date are unknown, and additional reader information is solicited!
There is certainly more to the J.M. Forbes story, and additional aspects of his life and adventures, like those of many field geologists and mineralogists of past generations, would make for interesting reading.
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