Darren Campbell
Northern News Services

NNSL (Jul 31/98) - Yvonne Baril and Pat Slade's trip to Yellowknife would have gone unnoticed by many if not for the Tibbitt Lake fire.

The 70-year-old twin sisters came to Yellowknife in hopes of learning more about, and visit, the Thompson-Lundmark mine site. But on the weekend the 160,000-hectare fire wiped out the remains of the abandoned gold mine, which was discovered by their father, Fred Thompson.

Since that information has come to light Yellowknifers are much more familiar with the sisters' trip.

"If we had come and the place hadn't burned down. No one would have contacted us, which would have been fine with us," said Baril.

Baril, who lives in Trail, B.C., and Slade, who calls Sudbury, Ont., home, were only 10 years old when their father came up north during the gold rush of 1938.

He discovered the site while flying around the area with another prospector. Thompson noticed some promising quartz strains from the air and then went down to investigate it.

"On the surface there was free gold in the quartz," said Baril. "It was very spectacular, so they started up a few claims."

The mine, near a lake also named for their father, opened in 1941 and was shut down briefly during the Second World War. It closed for good in 1949.

Neither sister was too interested in learning about the mine or their fathers work back in the 1940s. But Baril said that has changed as they get older. They are more interested in their father's work and where he did his work --especially Slade, who is fascinated by her family's genealogy.

"Teenage girls aren't all that interested in mines. "But you get more interested in it when you get older and your parents are not around to answer questions," said Baril. "What we wanted to do was get some pictures because we had no idea what the mine site looked like."

Although Slade and Baril's trip out to the mine site was ruined by the fire, they have still been able to make contacts in the city and learn more about the history of the site.

During their week-long stay in Yellowknife, they visited the NWT Chamber of Mines, met prospector Mike Piro and talked to prospector Walt Humphries on the phone.

She said they would have liked to have walked around the site, but they still feel the trip was worthwhile.

"It was a mild disappointment, not a major thing," said Baril. "We've made a lot of contacts and were finding out a lot of things."