Pictou County man’s name on an Arizona mine
A mineral deposit in Arizona is being named after the Pictou County man who discovered it.
Donald Clark joins a long list of individuals from Pictou County who have mines, mountains, towns and mineral deposits named after them.
“These geologists or engineers would be hired by a company to see what was there, and sure enough they would find whatever they were looking for,” said local historian John Ashton. “Especially in the mineral industry when an individual does years of research and searching for that seam. He deserves to be honoured.”
Clark’s work with the United States firm, Arizona Mining Inc., was essential in developing the manganese and silver oxide deposit.
“My father was a private man,” said Clark’s son, in a release from the company. “He wasn’t someone who would toot his own horn, so I think he would be very humbled by this gesture.”
The decision to name the Arizona deposit after Clark, who passed away in 2014, is, according to Ashton, par for the course for Pictou County residents.
He said many people will know the name George Mercer Dawson — a Pictou-born geologist in the 1860s who basically mapped Canada when it was developing as a country.
There was also a town in Walsenburg, Colo., named Pictou after a mining official from Pictou County.
“It goes on and on and on,” says Ashton.