Industry and Private Ownership
- The Gold Mine: Challenges and Opportunities (1866-1899)
- Smelting Silver and Cobalt (1903-1909)
- Stellite Production (1912-1917)
- Producing Insecticides (1918-1920)
- Diversification (1925-1951)
- The Decline (1955-1961)
The Gold Mine: Challenges and Opportunities (1866-1899)
| 1866 | Gold is discovered in a cave on a farm owned by John Richardson just north of Madoc. The Madoc gold rush begins. |
| 1866-1867 | Mining begins at Deloro. Gold-bearing ore is bound up with arsenic. A smelting process is required to separate the gold and the arsenic. |
| 1873 | Several claims around Deloro organized into the Gatling/Gold and Silver Mining Company and a new mill is built. |
| 1880 | Canada Consolidated Gold Mining Company acquires Deloro property. |
| 1882 | The "arsenic works" (a new 10-stamp mill, dry crusher, and chlorination building) is erected on the banks of the Moira River. The mill uses a chlorination process to separate the gold from the arsenic. |
| 1892 | Hastings Mining and Reduction Company operates the Deloro site briefly. |
| 1896 | Canadian Goldfields Ltd. acquires site. |
| 1898 | Successful research and development of white arsenic production using bromo-cyanide. A new mill, cyanide plant and laboratory are built. |
| 1899 | Atlas Arsenic mine begins development of the Five Acre Site north of the main Deloro development but only operates for four or five years. By 1901 the company builds a 10-stamp mill with a 10-drill air compressor plant, shaft houses, blacksmith shops, repair shops, office, and other mine buildings. |
Smelting Silver, and Cobalt (1903-1909)
| 1903 | Discovery of silver in Cobalt, Ontario |
| 1906 | M.J. O'Brien (a Renfrew businessman and railway contractor) hires former Canadian Goldfields mine engineer Kirkegaard and Queen's University metallurgist Kirkpatrick to create a process to reduce the ores from Cobalt, Ontario to silver, cobalt, and arsenic. |
| 1907 | M.J. O'Brien forms the Deloro Reduction and Mining Company and a new plant begins, using the Kirkpatrick-Kirkegaard process for refining ores. |
| 1909 | An oxides building and new arsenic plant are erected at Deloro. Trent River hydroelectric connection made to Deloro plant |
Stellite Production (1912-1917)
| 1912 | Queen's University metallurgist H.T. Kalmus develops a process for creating cobalt metals at the Deloro lab. In the United States, Elwood Haynes creates stellite, a new alloy of cobalt, chromium and tungsten. The Deloro plant is given the Canadian patent for stellite, and rights to markets in parts of Europe in exchange for a supply of cobalt metal for American production. |
| 1913 | A spur line from Marmora Station on the Central Ontario Railway is run into the Deloro plant. |
| 1914-18 | World War I causes boost of production in stellite. |
| 1916 | Deloro Mining and Reduction Company is renamed the Deloro Smelting and Refining Company Limited. |
| 1917 | New metals building is erected (largely for the production of stellite). |
Producing Insecticides (1918-1920)
| 1918-1919 | Several fires destroy old Canadian Goldfields mill complex and some workers' housing, the latter of which are rebuilt. |
| 1920 | Deloro Chemical Company is established and a plant erected to produce insecticides (in the 1920s arsenical based pesticides are significant in fighting the boll-weevil epidemic in the cotton fields of the southern United States). |
Diversification (1925-1951)
| 1925 | Competitive sources of cobalt are developed in the Belgian Congo. |
| 1929 | In Cobalt, Ontario many silver-cobalt mines close down. |
| 1929 | The Great Depression. |
| 1932 | Ore being received from Eldorado Nuclear of Port Hope, Ontario for cobalt metal refinement (the Eldorado mine on Great Bear Lake, NWT is the source of these ores). |
| 1937 | Deloro established new stellite plant in Birmingham, England. |
| 1939 | World War II and critical demand for stellite from Deloro plant for defence production. German invasion of Belgium redirects African copper-cobalt ores to Deloro for processing. US government brings 4,000 tons of cobalt to be stored at Deloro during the war. |
| 1940 | New research and development laboratory erected, followed by a chemical laboratory. Scientists at these facilities develop a smelting process for uranium for the Eldorado plant in Port Hope, as well as a hot wax process for precision casting. |
| 1948 | Deloro begins processing Moroccan ores for cobalt. |
| 1950 | Major re-development of site. Three main industrial sections now established: 1) the crushing, grinding, roasting and smelting departments; 2) the chemical section; and 3) the machine tool and casting division. Many earlier buildings are destroyed. The following products are now produced: silver, refined arsenic, cobalt oxide, cobalt slats, cobalt metal and powder, nickel oxide, and copper residues, as well as new machine parts. In the 50s there are new uses for cobalt: as a paint dryer; as a trace element in animal foods; in the chemical process for the production of nylon; as a binder for enamel; in the brewing of beer; and in cancer research and treatment. |
The Decline (1955-1961)
| 1955 | Stellite and precision casting sections move to Belleville. |
| 1958 | After the Korean war, the price of cobalt falls worldwide. Mining around Cobalt, Ontario is exhausted, and there is increased competition from African ores and Belgian smelting. Deloro is forced to cease cobalt processing. |
| Late 50s | Arsenical based insecticides give way to organic pesticides. Large piles of arsenic are stockpiled on site. |
| 1961 | The Deloro Mining and Smelting Company closes its plant. The property is transferred to Deloro Stellite of Belleville. Many buildings standing previous to 1940 now destroyed. |
| 1970 | British Oxygen purchases Deloro Stellite but not the Deloro site. The site is transferred to Erickson Construction, a subsidiary of M.J. O'Brien Ltd. |
| 1978 | Ministry of the Environment issues order, under the Environmental Protection Act, to site owner Erickson Construction Company Limited to control arsenic discharges to Moira River. |
| 1979 | Company fails to comply with ministry order and declares a lack of operating funds. The Ministry of the Environment issues a second order requiring the company to cease operations that affect the environment. The company abandons the site. The Ministry of the Environment invokes section 99 of the Environmental Protection Act and assumes environmental management of the site as remediator of last resort. |
