Strategic Minerals Research Articles

More Valuable than Gold: Korean Tungsten and the Japanese War Economy, 1910 to 1945

A central component of the Japanese government’s foreign policy after the First World War was its desire to control and secure access to strategic minerals necessary for munitions production. Two-thirds of the world supply of these strategic minerals—including metals like copper, lead, molybdenum, nickel, tungsten and zinc—was primarily under the commercial control of American and British interests. American geologists and foreign policy experts assumed that Anglo-American sanctions combined with the lack of mineral deposits in East Asia would prevent Japanese attempts at economic autarky. Yet these experts failed to appreciate the importance of the Korean peninsula. Korean minerals—in particular tungsten—enabled the Japanese war economy to partially withstand the economic strangulation of the Allied blockade and bombings in the last years of the war. After the war, Korean scholars documented, in great detail, the Japanese exploitation of these resources, yet this scholarship does not show how these Korean resources fit into the larger resource base of the so-called “Co-Prosperity Sphere.” This article examines the origins, development, and consequences of Japan’s exploitation of Korean mineral resources from 1910 to 1945 through a case study of tungsten and uses two distinct sets of sources: first, reports and studies produced by American geologists from the 1920s to the postwar period and, second, Japanese mining reports and statistics produced in Korea and Japan during the colonial period.

Price Dynamics of the World Gold Market: A Model Incorporating Inventories

Gold is regarded as a strategic mineral in many countries and its price is a key indicator of global business confidence. Therefore, various studies, albeit static analyses, have been conducted on the world gold market. There is need for dynamic modelling of the market, which would enhance understanding of the world market conditions, especially the long-term tendency of world gold prices, and hence facilitate long-term planning. Production schedules in many producing countries, especially in the developing world, have reacted to short-term price fluctuations, making them unstable. This study incorporates an inventory equation into the world market model for gold. Simultaneous equation approaches are used to estimate the model. From this model are derived the time-path for the world market price of gold and its dynamic characteristics in terms of whether or not there is evidence of convergence (dynamic stability) and the nature of such convergence. All regression results are consistent with theory, except that the supply function has a positive and significant constant, which may be linked to expectations that are rife in the market. However, both supply and inventory functions have very low explanatory powers. The price time-path converges without oscillations, from below, towards an intertemporal equilibrium. This equilibrium is estimated at slightly over US$100,000.00 per kilogram, based on an average world income (including income projections) calculated over a century (1980-2079). If the assumption of average income is relaxed, the intertemporal equilibrium price becomes variable dependent on the actual values of world income at a given time, which however, does not alter its dynamic characteristics. The results, therefore, show that gold price is dynamically stable. Short-term fluctuations, which are sometimes extreme, have no long-term effect on gold attractiveness, which means that they should not affect long-term production plans, especially if they are price reductions. The study could be improved by incorporating technical progress and price expectations into the model. Generally, it would be expected that inclusion of technical progress, especially as a uniform trend over time, would result in a moving equilibrium without altering the conclusion on convergence.

Victim of its own success? The platinum mining industry and the apartheid mineral property system in South Africa's political transition

The South African platinum industry has grown phenomenally since the mid 1990s to become the single largest component of the national mining sector in employment and sales-value terms. In line with Fine's (1992) contribution to a general theory of mining, this article presents an initial political economy of that industry by considering the critical role that the apartheid mineral property system played in its dominant strategy of competitive accumulation in the years leading to the current platinum boom. Emphasis is placed on the different forms of minerals ownership that mediated the access of platinum capital to mineral resources in the Bophuthatswana and Lebowa Bantustans, where the bulk of South Africa's vast platinum reserves were geopolitically located under apartheid and how the reproduction of these strategic mineral property relations was secured during the political transition to the benefit of the white platinum corporations. It concludes that the industry's very success in maintaining its proprietary control over the world's largest platinum endowment would combine with an unprecedented surge in global platinum demand to simultaneously position it as the most dynamic element of the post-apartheid mining economy and as the primary target of the new ANC government's minerals reform policy. [Victime de son propre succès? L'industrie minière de platine et le système apartheid de propriété minérale dans la transition politique en Afrique du Sud]. L'industrie du platine sud-africain a connu une croissance phénoménale depuis le milieu des années 1990 pour devenir la composante principale du secteur minier national en termes d'emploi et des ventes des valeurs actualisées. En ligne avec la contribution de Fine (1992) à une théorie générale de l'exploitation minière, cet article présente une économie politique initiale de cette industrie en considérant le rôle crucial que le système apartheid de propriété minérale a joué dans sa stratégie dominante d'accumulation compétitive dans les années qui avaient conduit à l'actuel boom économique de platine. L'accent est mis sur les différentes formes de propriétés minières qui ont servi de médiateur à l'accès du capital de platine pour les ressources minérales dans les bantoustans Bophuthatswana et Lebowa, les endroits géopolitiques de la majeure partie des vastes réserves de l'Afrique du Sud en platine sous l'apartheid, et comment la reproduction de ces rapports des propriétés minières stratégiques a été obtenues lors de la transition politique au profit des sociétés de platine caucasiennes. Il conclut que le succès même du secteur dans le maintien de son contrôle exclusif sur les rèserves mondiales de platine se combineraient avec une augmentation sans précédent de la demande mondiale de platine en le positionnant simultanément comme l'élément le plus dynamique de l'économie minière post apartheid et comme la cible principale du nouveau gouvernement de l'ANC en matière de politique de réforme minière. Mots-clés: exploitations minières de platine droits miniers Afrique du Sud propriété foncière Boputhatswana Lebowa

How do Investors Value Environmental Harm/Care? Private Equity Funds, Development Finance Institutions and the Partial Financialization of Nature‐based Industries

ABSTRACT Private equity funds, mostly domiciled in secrecy jurisdictions, are dominant investors in the resource‐based economies of Africa. Some of the investments that these funds make have been speculative and based on perceived high‐value ‘futures’ in biodiversity, bio‐fuels and land, carbon capture or strategic minerals. However, private equity funds are also heavily invested in mining, energy and infrastructure, which also generate wealth from the non‐human world; ‘old’ markets alongside the ‘new’ markets for discovered nature‐based commodities. This article reviews how private equity funds, and their partners in development finance institutions, frame and value the consequential impact of their industries on people and things. It then explores how this valuation, and other related calculative technologies of ‘concern’ for the ‘environment’— such as risk assessment and offsetting — are incorporated into firms’ investment decision making. This enquiry finds that: 1) financiers currently employ thin, partial and pseudo‐mathematical methods of assessing environmental impact and worth; and 2) that environmental and developmental impact ‘science’ is a performative technology,with only marginal relation to the material world it seeks to measure and protect. Using calculative technologies in which financial considerations are privileged, financiers have wrought a dissociated, incomplete and partial valorization of the non‐human world. Nonetheless, 3) these calculative devices assist in legitimizing private equity funds as institutional leaders in pre‐existing power structures which exploit natural resources in Africa for the benefit of money‐holders. These propositions roughly correspond to the technical, empirical and theoretical dimensions of a socio‐technical arrangement applying to nature‐based accumulation, which, overall, performs a political process of financialization.

History of Field Observations on Volcanic Rocks of Western Mexico, Pre-Columbian to Recent

By the time the first detailed reports on western Mexico's volcanic rocks had begun to appear in the 1970s, most of the earlier observations on these rocks and most knowledge of those who made these observations were all but forgotten. A review of previous field observations in this region shows, however, a long history of geologic discovery reflecting or even preceding developments elsewhere.Ethnological studies suggest that the Pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Sierra Madre Occidental (SMO) observed the characteristics of rock formations in their sierra homeland and understood something of the regional stratigraphic relationships. Late sixteenth and early seventeenth century explorers of the Spanish Colonial Period singled out volcanic rock known to them as piedra de malpaís for special recognition, and Padre Kino and his fellow explorers clearly recognized the volcanic origin of piedra de malpaís decades prior to similar observations in Europe. As the Spanish Colonial Period came to a close, Andrés Manuel del Río help organize a state-of-theart mining college in Mexico City where students were instructed in Werner's geognosy prior to their taking positions in Mexico's mining industry, most of it located in western Mexico's volcanic rocks.Although the first part of the tumultuous period between Mexico's revolutions of 1810 and 1910 saw few advances in geological knowledge, the reign of President Porfirio Díaz produced a geologic map of Mexico, the founding of the Instituto de Geología, and an ‘American invasion’ of geologists and mining engineers who locally gathered information on the nature of volcanic rocks of western Mexico. During the same period, Instituto geologist Ezequiel Ordóñez established the general stratigraphic sequence in the SMO, recognized the widespread occurrence of rhyolite there, and applied the petrographic microscope to the study of SMO volcanic rocks. The first identification of ignimbrites in the SMO came as a result of the World War II-era search for strategic minerals, and NASA's push to put a man on the Moon supported a series of student mapping projects producing the SMO's first geologic maps showing individual ignimbrite units and calderas.

태평양 심해저 망간단괴 개발사업의 경제적 파급효과

The securing of raw material is an important requirement for economic development. Many countries, including Korea, actively seek out a stable supply of minerals such as manganese. Manganese nodules are rock concretions on the sea bottom formed of concentric layers of iron and manganese hydroxides around a core and include several strategic minerals necessary for economic development. In particular, the manganese nodule development project (MNDP) plays an important role in the Korean national economy. This study attempts to apply input-output (I-O) analysis in investigating the economic impacts of the MNDP in the Korean national economy. A static I-O framework was employed, focusing on four topics in its application; the production-inducing impacts, the value-added-inducing impacts, the employment-inducing impacts and R&D-inducing impacts of MNDP investments on other sectors. To this end, several versions of the demand-driven models are utilized. In addition, inter-industry linkage analysis is performed to obtain information on the forward and backward linkage effects of industries, including MNDP, to quantify the strength of causation among these industries.

Haunted by 'Specter of Unavailability,' Experts Huddle Over Critical Materials

The U.S. Department of Energy and counterparts in Japan and Europe have been holding workshops to brainstorm on how to ensure supplies of rare earth metals and other strategic minerals and to stimulate research on alternatives.

The Graphites of New York: Scientific and Aesthetic Surprises

New York State hosts graphite deposits that have been historically and economically important for this “strategic mineral.” These and other graphite occurrences in the state have produced, and in s...

The Realities of Community Based Natural Resource Management and Biodiversity Conservation in Sub-Saharan Africa

This is an historic overview of conservation in Sub-Saharan Africa from pre-colonial times through the present. It demonstrates that Africans practiced conservation that was ignored by the colonial powers. The colonial market economy combined with the human and livestock population explosion of the 21st century are the major factors contributing to the demise of wildlife and critical habitat. Unique insight is provided into the economics of a representative safari company, something that has not been readily available to Community Based Natural Resources Management (CBNRM) practitioners. Modern attempts at sharing benefits from conservation with rural communities will fail due to the low rural resource to population ratio regardless of the model, combined with the uneven distribution of profits from safari hunting that drives most CBNRM programs, unless these ratios are changed. Low household incomes from CBNRM are unlikely to change attitudes of rural dwellers towards Western approaches to conservation. Communities must sustainably manage their natural areas as "green factories" for the multitude of natural resources they contain as a means of maximizing employment and thus household incomes, as well as meeting the often overlooked socio-cultural ties to wildlife and other natural resources, which may be as important as direct material benefits in assuring conservation of wildlife and its habitat. For CBNRM to be successful in the long-term, full devolution of ownership over land and natural resources must take place. In addition, as a means of relieving pressure on the rural resource base, this will require an urbanization process that creates a middleclass, as opposed to the current slums that form the majority of Africa‘s cities, through industrialization that transforms the unique natural resources of the subcontinent (e.g., strategic minerals, petroleum, wildlife, hardwoods, fisheries, wild medicines, agricultural products, etc.) in Africa.

Cattle Grazing Distribution and Efficacy of Strategic Mineral Mix Placement in Tropical Brazilian Pastures

Abstract A study was conducted in Brazil to identify factors affecting grazing distribution of yearling Nelore cross heifers and to evaluate the efficacy of placement of a salt–mineral mix away from water to improve uniformity of grazing. Two pastures (25 ha and 42 ha) were evaluated for four 15-d sessions. Mineral mix was placed 590 m to 780 m from water during two sessions and at water for two sessions. Stubble heights were measured at the beginning and end of each session in 1-ha subunits of each pasture. Cattle locations were recorded on day 13 and 14 of each session by horseback observers. Heifers avoided areas with a preponderance of forbs and taller grass (P 0.10). Stubble height reduction was more uniform (P < 0.05) when the mineral mix was at water compared to away from water. In contrast, heifers spent less time farther from water w...

Flotation of chromite and serpentine

Chromite is an important strategic mineral usually associated with other gangue minerals, mainly silicates. A good knowledge of the flotation behaviour of chromite and the establishment of conditions for its selective separation from the gangue minerals might help the future exploitation of chromite deposits. In this paper, the floatability of chromite and serpentine fine particles by sodium oleate was investigated in-depth, aiming to separation during mineral processing, i.e. to float chromite from serpentine. Process parameters investigated were the effect of collector concentration, the pH value, the type and concentration of various modifiers on the flotation behaviour of chromite. The conditions investigate where selective flotation from gangue minerals (serpentine) would be possible.

Nelson A. Rockefeller’s Office of Inter-American Affairs (1940-1946) and Record Group 229

Nelson A. Rockefeller’s Office of Inter-American Affairs (1940-1946) and Record Group 229

The mineral content of dairy cattle feed resources in Nakuru district, Kenya

AbstractThe feed resources commonly used by farmers in the Nakuru district of Kenya had mineral contents below the levels recommended for ruminants, so it was concluded that strategic mineral supplementation of rations seems necessary. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley &amp; Sons, Ltd

Balancing interests beyond the water's edge: Identifying the key interests that determined US foreign policy towards apartheid South Africa

The United States, in formulating a foreign policy towards apartheid South Africa, attempted to balance a number of conflicting interests. These interests are divided into three categories (strategic, economic and human rights interests), and examined in turn. Initially, strategic considerations were to the fore. South Africa was judged by Washington DC to be a reliable ally on the tip of a continent vulnerable to Communist expansion. Strategic minerals and this country's location at a ‘choke point’ on the Cape sea route were arguments often aired. The Union, and then the Republic, of South Africa was also a profitable market for US commercial interests. No US foreign policy addressing apartheid could ignore this economic relationship. There remained, however, the question of apartheid. No simple relationship of friendship, based on shared interests, could exist between these governments as long as this programme of social engineering endured. Eventually, in the mid-1980s, the US would impose punitive sanctions against the Republic, with human rights interests finally superseding strategic and economic concerns.

La nouvelle géopolitique des minéraux : Une étude sur l’évolution de l’impact international des minéraux stratégiques

This article explores changes in the international political significance of "strategic minerals" over the past half-century. The method of analysis is comparative historical, or "diachronic", and the major issues examined are: 1) minerals as a cause of international conflict; 2) minerals as a factor contributing to the military potential of states; and 3) the question of mineral scarcity. In addition to the above issues, the author analyzes two central concepts, "geopolitics" and "strategic minerals" . He concludes that while it does make sense to speak of a "new geopolitics of Minerals" in the post-1973 era, there are nevertheless important ways in which recent strategic-minerals issues resemble those of the earlier period under examination, the interwar years (and, in particular, the 1930s). What does not seem to have changed in respect of strategic minerals since the 1930 s is that access to them continues ultimately to be a function of political processes, and therefore the access question remains what it was, a matter of geopolitical concern. Where there have been differences in the relevance of strategic minerals, these have mainly consisted in: 1) the declining importance of minerals as a major contributory factor in the breakdown of world order; 2) the lessening of what had formerly been a deterministic equation between mineral possession and military potential; and 3) the increased salience in the post-1973 era of the perception that access will be affected by the growing scarcity of minerals, whether due to the actual depletion of reserves or politically induced supply disruptions.

La vulnérabilité stratégique des minéraux : les relations triangulaires entre la République fédérale allemande, l’Afrique du Sud et l’Union soviétique.

Resource diplomacy has emerged as a key element in international relations. The controversy over the use of the grain embargo and persistent concern about the Middle East has allowed food and oil to continue to gain a great deal of attention as weapons of resource diplomacy. Other raw materials, nevertheless, also lend themselves to analysis of this sort. Strategic minerals, in particular, have been increasingly looked at as means of influence in both North/South and the East I West contexts. This study hopes to contribute to this growing body of literature by examining the significance (and merger) of the North/South and East I West contexts in regard to strategic minerals with particular reference to the Federal Republic of Germany. The paper examines the triangular relationship in strategic minerals between the FRG, Southern Africa and the Soviet Union. A number of scenarios have been put forward pertaining to a Soviet threat to Western mineral imports from Southern Africa. The most plausible of these scenarios appears to be that rather than the Soviets initiating action in Africa they respond to events in order to undermine confidence in the West. Such a scenario has serious implications for the FRG. Still, our tentative findings are that dire forecasts about a Soviet stranglehold on the FRG in terms of minerals are overplayed. It is suggested that coping mechanisms do exist for the FRG's supplies of raw materials.

L’Union soviétique et les minerais stratégiques : Erreurs et vérités

This is an analysis of the major strategic minerals (sometimes called strategic materials), including some of the precious metals, which are vital to the Western economies. It focuses primarily on Soviet strategic minerals policies and examines the conflicting hypotheses for and against a resource war waged by the Soviet Union. The conclusions reached on the strength of the evidence so far is that Soviet policies have been chiefly economic and motivated by economic self-interest ; the Soviet Union is seen as an eager competitor for markets to acquire hard currency and not as a power eager to deprive the West of critical resources. A case is also made for the increasing importance of materials science, ocean mining and substitution, which is likely to make the West, including the USSR, invulnerable to supply disruptions in the future.

Conflict in The Congo: Historical and Regional Perspectives

CONFLICT IN THE CONGO: HISTORICAL AND REGIONAL PERSPECTIVES Ch. Didier Gondola. The History of Congo. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2002. xxviii + 181 pp. Notable People in the History of Congo. Selected Bibliography. Index. $39.95. Cloth. Kevin C Dunn. Imagining the Congo: The International Relations of Identity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. xi + 196 pp. Works Cited. Index. $79.95. Cloth. $24.95. Paper. Colette Braeckman. Lumumba, un Crime d'Etat. Bruxelles: Les Editions Aden, 2002. 99 pp. euro8.50. Paper. Colette Braeckman. Les Nouveaux Predateurs: Politique des puissances en Afrique centrale. Paris: Fayard, 2003. 301 pp. Chronology. Bibliography. euro19. Paper. Ludo Martens. Kabila et la Revolution congolaise: Panafricanisme ou neocolonialisme. Antwerp: Editions EPO, Tome 1, 2002. 692 pp. Maps. Index. euro38. Paper. Howard Adelman and Govind C. Rao, eds. War and Peace in Zaire/Congo: Analyzing and Evaluating Intervention: 1996-1997. Trenton, NJ.: Africa World Press, 2004. x + 344 pp. Index. $29.95. Paper. The Congo (formerly Zaire) is a metaphor for the plight of the whole African continent. Although it is a country richly endowed with natural resources and minerals, its population remains one of the poorest and most conflict-ridden in the world. Sadly, from the first incursions of Portuguese explorers in the Kongo Kingdom in 1482 to the present, the country has constantly been plagued by political strife and ethnic and regional conflict. Currently a war goes on that has claimed about four million lives since August 1998. As some of the works reviewed here show, the Congo's predicament may best be explained in terms of its historical relationship with the West, based on political domination and economic exploitation and the pursuit by the West of a consistent and systematic policy of balkanization or divide-and-rule. In the wake of a recent revival of interest in this country following the publication of books by Adam Hochschild (King Leopold's Ghost [Houghton Mifflin, 1998]) and Ludo De Witte (The Assassination ofLumumba [Verso, 2001]), and of the subsequent report of the Belgian Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the tragic circumstances of Patrice Lumumba's death, six authors-Congolese, Belgian, and North American-have taken a fresh look at the burdened history of the Congo from both regional and international perspectives. In The History of Congo, Ch. Didier Gondola, a Congolese scholar at Indiana University, makes use of a multidisciplinary and long-term perspective on the history of the Congo, starting with the indigenous kingdoms and empires (Kongo and Luba/Lunda). He surveys in turn the colonial conquest, the brutal rule of King Leopold II's Congo Free State, Belgian paternalistic colonialism, the painful birth of independent Congo, and its uneven development through three republics, including Mobutu's long dictatorial and predatory rule (1965-97), the failed transition to democracy (1990-97), the short and ill-fated tenure of Laurent-Desire Kabila (1997-2001), and finally the ongoing continental war. Besides looking at government and politics, Gondola looks at economy and society, as well as health, education, and culture. He concludes that any Congolese leader who comes between the West and its access to Congo's strategic mineral resources will be eliminated, as the tragic fate of and Kabila clearly demonstrates: Lumumba became the last obstacle preventing Western governments and companies from making Congo their own neocolonial state . . . . It seems. . . that Kabila's death was part of a large, wellorchestrated plan. This plan was probably masterminded by one or more of the foreign governments that still control Congo in a bid to replace him with a more amenable figurehead (123, 173). Gondola's broad, wide-ranging, and well-documented volume, written clearly and from the perspective of the Congolese people, includes many useful features: current and former names of places, a time line of historical events, biographical notes on Congo's most notable leaders, and a chapter-by-chapter annotated bibliography. …

David Moody Hopkins (1921-2001)

David M. Hopkins, a Quaternary geologist widely known for his broad-ranging studies of the Bering Land Bridge region (Beringia), passed away at his home in Menlo Park, California, on November 2, 2001. Dave was a longtime member of Alaskan units of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). In search of a deeper understanding of Beringia, he became a pioneer in interdisciplinary research and in collaborative research with Russian investigators. Following his retirement from the USGS in 1985, Dave became director of the Alaskan Quaternary Center and Professor of Quaternary Studies at the Fairbanks campus of the University of Alaska. During the 57 years of his professional career, he was a mentor, friend, and source of inspiration to several generations of Arctic scholars. ... After graduating from the University of New Hampshire with a bachelor's degree in Geology in 1942, he joined the USGS and began graduate studies at Harvard University. Dave spent his initial field seasons with the USGS in southern regions of Alaska, where he investigated strategic minerals, engineering geology, and other aspects of geology that were considered essential to the ongoing war effort. In 1944, he was inducted into the Army and assigned to carry out meteorological observations at Cold Bay, situated at the tip of the Alaska Peninsula. Following his discharge, Dave resumed graduate studies at Harvard and field work with the USGS. He obtained an M.S. degree in Geology (1948) and a Ph.D. in Quaternary Geology (1955) from Harvard University. In 1947, Dave began geological investigations on the Seward Peninsula under the permafrost program of the USGS Alaska Terrain and Permafrost Section (which later became the Branch of Alaskan Geology). ... In 1948, he initiated a productive collaboration with the botanist Robert Sigafoos. Their seminal publications on the interactions of permafrost, soil, and vegetation on the Seward Peninsula are considered classics today. Dave also began a long-term collaboration with the archeologist Louis Giddings on dating and reconstructing the paleoecology of prehistoric village sites and other early human habitations in northwestern Alaska. ... Dave's investigations of elevated and submerged gold-bearing beaches at Nome during the 1950s initiated his long-lasting interest in the sea-level history of Beringia and the paleoecology of parts of the Bering platform that are submerged today. ... Dave's broadening interests in the paleoecology of Beringia led to increasing contacts with Russian colleagues that developed into a fruitful, 40-year collaboration across the Bering Strait. ... After Dave's retirement from the USGS, he began a second career of teaching and research as Distinguished Professor of Quaternary Studies at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks (UAF). ... As a direct result of Dave's broad-ranging research on the northern Seward Peninsula, the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) set aside much of his former field area as the Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. ... Dave's scientific influence encompasses such diverse fields as bedrock geology, marine geology, paleontology, limnology, hydrology, ecology, archeology, and paleoclimatology - the topics of his more than 200 refereed papers and abstracts. Numerous awards and commendations from the USGS and other scientific organizations recognized his contributions. ... During his highly productive career, Dave always found time to advise and encourage younger colleagues and students. ... We shall all miss his warmth, his humor, and his infectious passion for Beringia, but his legacy of inspired research and interdisciplinary scholarship will be enduring. ...

Professor Allan Fraser Wilson, 1921–2001

Allan Fraser Wilson who died on 28 May 2001 in Brisbane, Queensland at the age of 80 was born at Croydon Park, Adelaide, South Australia on 15 May 1921. He was the third child of Alexander Wilson, a Church of Christ minister and his wife Ruby. The family subsequently lived in the Strathalbyn area of South Australia where Allan completed his primary and secondary schooling at Naracorte and Strathalbyn. Allan was passionate about science and education and studied simultaneously at the University of Adelaide and the Adelaide Teachers College. During this time he came under the influence of the explorer-scientist Sir Douglas Mawson who was Professor of Geology and Mineralogy at Adelaide. In 1944 Allan obtained his Teaching Certificate and also graduated from the University of Adelaide with a BSc in geology with first-class honours. Mawson was impressed by Allan’s boundless energy and his flair for mineral identification and encouraged him to continue his studies. Allan shared Mawson’s dual interests in fundamental science and exploration and they collaborated in the search for uranium and other strategic minerals in South Australia and the Northern Territory. During his MSc research Allan taught primary and secondary school classes, lectured casually at the university and was also involved in a number of Christian organizations. It was through the latter that he met Betty Skinner who shared his strong religious convictions. They were married in 1946. Allan completed the MSc under Mawson’s supervision in 1947 and was appointed a lecturer in geology at the …