Gold in the Kokrines Hills of Alaska

PROLOGUE

The giver of life, light, and warmth given to Earth formed in a nebula, an interstellar cloud of dust and gas made up mostly of Hydrogen Gas, 4.5 Billion years ago. As parts of the interstellar cloud undergo gravitational collapse, it forms a rotating giant ball of gas, and as the collapse continues, the temperature and pressure within the mass increases to 10,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit, then 15,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

This causes the ball of gas to rotate faster and faster, until at the temperature of approximately 27,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit, nuclear fusion begins at the very core of the gas ball. Our Sun has just been born, and with temperatures reaching this critical stage, our Sun violently expands to many times its normal size and explodes. Matter is sent hurtling through space at great speeds in every direction before gravitational forces pull most of the material back into another massive gas ball. The expansion and violent explosion happens again and again, but each expansion, explosion and contraction grows weaker and weaker until our Sun becomes a stable life giving force where no more explosions occur.

In the process of expanding and exploding, massive amounts of material are thrown so far away from the Sun that its gravitational force cannot bring them back. Over millions of years, this matter formed our Solar System and the one small, beautiful blue ball we now call our Earth.

Our molten planet cooled enough to form the outer layers of solid crust three billion years ago. Out—gassing and volcanic activity produced a primordial atmosphere that would bring death to any living creature that came through the outer atmosphere or attempted to land on Earth, or any of the other rocky planets in our solar system.

The land surface over the next 2.5 billion years continually reshaped the continents, bringing the minerals of gold, silver and other precious metals to the surface before being swallowed by the massive changes of the surfaces of the continents. Deep in the Earth where the minerals and metals where first formed, a large volume of Gold, one tenth of the total amount on Earth, found a resting place close enough to the surface that the temperature where it lay never became hot enough to melt the Gold. So there it rested, a solid piece of Gold 1,766 feet long, three feet across and five feet deep.

The continents drifted across the face of Earth until the first supercontinent was formed 750 million years ago, with the large block of gold resting close to what is now Australia. The continent was called Rodinia and it broke apart 50 million years later, and again the continents drifted across the face of the Earth, with the gold now resting peacefully close to the Hawaiian Islands, until the second supercontinent was formed some 600 million years ago. This supercontinent was called Pannotia and it lasted 200 hundred millions years before breaking apart.

The third and final supercontinent was formed 300 million years ago, and still the gold rested undisturbed in the middle of South America. The supercontinent was named Pangaea and it lasted 120 million years before breaking apart into the continents we know today. The massive piece of gold now rested twenty-five feet below the earth, close to the Kokrines Hills of Alaska.

One hundred million years ago, the land that is presently known as Alaska and Canada was a sub-tropical paradise, teaming with animal life that had lived, died and decomposed for millions of years, building layer upon layer of animal material. For millions of years the heat and pressure changed the remains of microscopic plants and animals into oil and natural gas. Compressed by the plant and soil material that formed inch by inch, and the volcanic ash that time after time fell on the land from erupting volcanoes, the layers formed, year after year. The land below a few hundred feet felt the pressure of millions of pounds per square inch compress the plants and animals until natural gas and black oil begins to trickle from one small area to another. The small trickles found empty spaces between the compressed land and settled into small black pools of oil and gas. While gold and silver formed veins deep in the lower crust where the metal lay, until again the pressure deep inside the Earth pushed the metals toward the surface, forming long tubes and veins of gold and silver along with other precious metals, but the one giant road of gold was never disturbed.

As millions of years passed, the small pools trickle into larger and larger pools until vast pools of oil and gas quietly waited for man to come into existence and find the knowledge to bring this black gold and gas to the surface along with the other metals of Earth.

Fifty million years ago the North Pacific Tectonic Plate shifted, causing a massive amount of the Pacific Ocean’s water to undulate Alaska and most of Canada under half a mile of water. After that the ice age began; time and time again in the next forty million years, all of North America was under a mile of ice, which would recede and reform over the North American continent laying down plankton and algae and the life that floated in the sea to make the oil and gas the world now extracts.

Ten million years ago, the ice was melted by one of the largest volcanic explosions on Earth; the land under what is now Yellow Stone National park erupted beneath the ice. Within months, the ice over Alaska and Canada was completely gone as ash poured down for hundreds of years from massive eruptions over the land. First building small pockets of land surrounded by the sea, but the eruptions only grew larger and more violent as the center of the Earth spit forth its molten rocks along with the metals that had been formed billions of years ago.

Soon the land was covered in lakes until one last massive explosion shook the continent and covered the land in thousands of feet of ash. In this last massive explosion, gold from deep in the belly of the Earth’s core found vents to the surface and spewed golden particles and nuggets across the Alaskan landscape.

As the millenniums passed, weather eroded the hills and mountains releasing some of the gold to the surface. Most, a few feet below the surface, stayed hidden where additional volcanic ash would again enclose the gold deep in the ground.

In the last climactic explosion, the Kokrines Hills were formed and pushed the one massive block of gold close to the surface, where it silently laid, millennium after millennium after millennium, waiting for man to find it.

Chapter 1

With only a few weeks left before the short summer was over and temperatures of minus thirty degrees were about to descend on the drilling crew, Paul Thin, Drilling Chief for Endicott Exploration Company, was cussing a blue streak as the roughneck held the last of the diamond drill bits in his hands. Broken in three places, Paul Thin lifted one of the pieces and threw it as far into the swirling snow as he could heave it. It didn’t make him feel any better, and the roughneck backed up a few steps waiting to see what his boss was going to do with the other two broken pieces. If the chief looked at him he knew he had better turn and run as fast as he could so as to outrun the lump of metal that would be flung at his body.

The roughneck knew he had it coming, because he had allowed too much pressure to be put on the diamond bit as it tried to bore through the last small amount of solid rock. He kicked himself because he had been told less than an hour ago that this was the last diamond drill bit the company had on location and it would be too late in the season to bring another one in.

He had taken his eyes off the gauge for only a few seconds as he turned and lit a cigarette, but the lighter was hard to keep a flame going and he had cupped his hands and diverted his eyes from the pressure gauge. He actually felt the break before he heard the loud popping coming from deep below. The drill was stopped less than ten seconds later, but by then it was too late, the damage was already done and there was nothing he could do about it.

After drilling four dry holes, this fifth one held tremendous potential with the discovery of oil at two thousand feet and again at four thousand feet. Drill Chief Paul Thin knew he had pushed his luck too far, he knew he should have been satisfied at the four thousand level and completed the drill test at that depth, but he had the black gold fever and wanted to send in this last report to Hawthorn Douglas, the company’s top Engineer and Geologist, letting his good friend know that his instincts and geological experience had been correct when he had battled the company and told the board of directors that this was the best potential in the whole area in the vast holdings the company had acquired a few years ago. He felt the six thousand foot hole would produce even more information on the potential of the site.

Chief Thin had worked for a number of years with Hawthorn Douglas; everyone called him Thorn, except Chief Thin, who called him H.D. from the day they were both lost in a whiteout less than three hundred feet from their camp. Knowing if they made the wrong decision they could walk three feet past their tents and be lost forever in the frozen wilderness; Hawthorn Douglas had made his decision.

Chief Thin was 100% sure the direction they should go in, but Thorn was just the opposite, and because he was the senior his decision stood. There were seven men in the group, plus Thorn, and three men tied themselves by rope to Thorn and followed him. Chief Thin and the other three men would not take the chance of getting lost in the whiteout and chose to wait out the storm. Everyone knew if the storm lasted more than an hour that when they were found, their bodies would be frozen stiff, and yet they chose to wait.

Unable to stand upright, Thorn half crawled through the roaring wind and snow for half an hour, half pulling and half dragging the three men tied behind him until he literally bumped into one of the camp’s tents. Five minutes later, Thorn had five hundred feet of rope tied to his waist as he began a wide circle from the camp. He went out one hundred feet the first time and when he felt the tug of the rope from one of the men at the camp telling him he had swung in a 90 degree arch, he played out another hundred feet deeper into the whiteout. After the second one hundred feet, he started walking with the rope taught until he felt the pull of the rope from the men in camp, telling him he had walked the complete 90 degrees. It was now going on a full hour from the time he had left his Chief Driller and three other men huddled in the blinding snow.

By now Thorn could feel his body core dropping and he knew it wouldn’t be long before he would have to abandon the search. Unable to feel his feet or hands, Thorn called on all the experience from a dark time of long ago that he had suppressed deep in his mind. Willing his training to kick in, he stumbled back to his feet and let out a primordial scream into the face of the storm battering his body. He had been taught, and had even taught men, that getting angry and screaming at your enemy releases endorphins, giving the man the chance for flight or fight. In this case, it gave Thorn the energy to fight as he stumbled on.

Releasing another hundred feet of rope, Thorn again walked until the rope was taught before starting his 90 degree swing. Three quarters of the way through his third crawl and walk, he stumbled over one of the four men, all still huddled in the same position as he had left them. All were half frozen, but when Thorn gave two quick pulls notifying the men in camp that he had found them, a dozen men clamped metal rings to the rope and pushed through the swirling and blinding snow until they too, literally stepped on the back of Thorn’s legs as he was knelt in the snow rubbing the arms and legs of his chief driller.

One man lost a foot to frostbite, another lost two fingers, and Paul Thin lost part of his left ear; other than that, they knew they were blessed to have survived at all, and they owed it to Thorn Douglas. Chief Thin started calling Thorn H.D., not for Hawthorn Douglas, but because he said God had looked down from Heaven and guided Thorn’s mind to deliver his men to safety. Thorn thought it was funny that his Chief Driller would find something in his initials to say what he did and to call him H.D. What he really meant was that it was heaven’s delivery of his safety by his good friend. Thorn laughed a lot the first few times someone asked him why his chief driller was calling him H.D.

Chapter 2

Still disgusted that his roughneck failed to follow his orders, Chief Thin felt like throwing the remaining two pieces of drill bit at him, but instead only shook his head and dropped the broken bits on the steel floor.

Shut it down and let’s go home, everyone. The Chief shouted from the wheel house to the seven men under his command. Two hours later, two snow trucks with eight men inside headed for Fairbanks, Alaska, where a small office of Endicott Exploration was located.

Typing on his computer the whole way, Chief Thin had the report done and printed off before he stepped out of the truck six hours later. Handing the report to one of the clerks, he instructed him to give it to Hawthorn Douglas as soon as he got in. Chief Thin didn’t know that Hawthorn Douglas and his family were with a group of Endicott Exploration employees that were heading for a vacation some sixty miles from Hughes, Alaska in the Kokrines Hills. The company had a very specious cabin; some would call it a lodge, at the start of the Melozinta River, and for the last few years a number of Endicott employees spent a few weeks of vacation in this remote area, and this was also one of the lodges that Endicott used for business.

Realizing Thorn Douglas was one of the employees that had left the day before for the lodge and wouldn’t be back for two weeks, the clerk instead addressed the report to Frazer Blade, Chairman of the Board for Endicott Exploration Company, and whose office was in San Francisco.

On board the twenty-five passenger cruiser that Endicott Exploration Company owned was sixteen company employees and their families. Two office clerks, a junior engineer and his family, totaling eleven individuals, leaned over the railing as the cruiser turned a bend in the Melozitna River and they saw for the first time the beautiful lodge perched some fifty feet above the river that would turn into a small steam less than a quarter mile away. Gregory Felt and his wife were standing by Thorn and his wife, Peggy, and their two year old son, Johnny, at the very front of the ship talking as the boat docked.

What a beautiful place, Thorn. How come I’ve never been invited here before? Gregory laughed as he spoke to Thorn.

You have no idea how many employees request to use this lodge in the three short months we have it open… you’re lucky; there was a cancellation a few days ago and your name was next on the list to be called to see if you were available.

Thorn lifted his son to his shoulders so he could look over the ship and watch as the ropes were thrown down to the small dock where one of the crew jumped off and secured the boat

Has anyone ever found gold in this area, Thorn?

In this area, not that I know of, Gregory, don’t you ever think of anything else but gold when you’re looking at land?

Hey, I’m a Geologist trained to look for gold; what do you expect me to do? I’ve been all over the world chasing the yellow stuff. Even my dreams are filled with golden nuggets burying me to my waist. The four adults laughed as he mentioned dreaming of gold, Johnny didn’t understand what they were laughing about, but his attention was centered on the large rope the man was tying around one of the wooden pillars, and he watched intently as the man made a knot and waved to the captain of the boat.

So, why ask about gold here? Thorn asked. Gregory threw his hands in the air and waved them around as if telling Thorn to look at the surroundings.

Well, because of the layout of the land. Look to the right and left of this clearing, and then look back a mile or so at the Kokrines Hills. Both Thorn and Peggy looked at the view he was describing, and even though Thorn was also a Geologist, he hadn’t been trained beyond his basic training for other formations of the land, except for looking at the land from an oil expert’s eyes.

I see a beautiful landscape, Gregory, but nothing else.

A lot of times, Thorn, you find gold at the bottom of waterfalls.

Sure, I was taught that, but where are the waterfalls around here? Gregory started to laugh, but caught himself halfway through it. It wasn’t smart to laugh at one of the six men on the board of directors of Endicott Exploration.

Sorry about that, Thorn. Sometimes I forget the thirty years experience I have in finding gold, and thinking other people are look through the same eyes as mine.

There’s no waterfall now, but the ship is floating directly above where a waterfall once flowed. If you look real close, about a mile away at the Kokrines Hills, you will see the waterfalls. Thorn had a blank expression on his face, and Gregory knew he still didn’t understand what he was trying to tell him.

Let me put it another way: you know about Niagara Falls right? Thorn and Peggy nodded their heads as they turned and looked back at the tiny waterfall they saw in the far distance.

The Niagara Falls was at one time more than thirty miles downstream from where it is today, and that’s what has happened here. By the formation of the cliffs and hard rock on either side of this canyon, the water eroded the falls each year until it hit the Hills beyond.

Ok, now I understand, gold is flushed out of the hills and into streams, and because it’s heavy, a lot of times it collects in deep holes, just like you would find underneath a waterfall.

That’s right, Thorn, so someday you board of directors might want me to do a little research in this valley. Thorn smiled at his wife as he pulled his son down from his shoulders.

Nice try, Gregory, but your name will be put on the waiting list just like the rest of Endicott’s employees. Gregory laughed and slapped Thorn on the back as the group started departing the ship.

Didn’t hurt to try and get a few extra weeks with my wife up here did it? It’s a beautiful place. Gregory smiled at his wife and shrugged as they started for the off ramp.

Peggy slipped her arm inside her husband’s and put her cheek against his shoulder.

I’m glad you talked me out of showing in Dallas, Thorn. I do love coming here for the peace and quiet. And Johnny loves playing in the small outdoor play area.

She pinched his arm as she withdrew her arm from his. You promised me when I cancelled my show that you would be here for the full two weeks; I’ll be very upset if the phone rings and Frazer or John Putnam calls for one of their small favors they always seem to have when you try to go on vacation.

"Nope, won’t happen this time. I told the board at last week’s meeting that I would be unavailable for these two