Independent gold miner Stan Bone reflects on rich 49-year career
Nillumbik’s Stan Bone, whose career spanned almost five decades, dazzles with his tales of underground mines, shafts and tunnels. But how did the region’s last independent gold miner start his memorable journey?
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Nillumbik’s last independent gold miner Stan Bone spent 50 years chasing the treasured ore until he was no longer physically able.
But the Smiths Gully man said if he was fit enough he would still be doing what he was “born to do”.
“Three generations of my family worked in the gold mining industry, so I simply followed my family’s footprints — but I also think it was meant to be the course I took in life,” he said.
Mr Bone’s career started at age 17 in 1960 at his father’s gold mine in Yarrambat, the Golden Crown — located between North Oaklands and Ironbark roads.
The 76-year-old then worked as a contract miner, digging for copper in northeastern Victoria. He came back to Melbourne and, together with his uncle, constructed two tunnels beneath the Eastern Fwy at Hoddle St.
“It was a fairly challenging task for a couple of bushies — no one else wanted to take it on, so we did,” Mr Bone said.
“We doubled our going rate and got the job. If we could double the rate as the fourth contractor in line and get the job, imagine what the cost of it was in the first place.”
Mr Bone then worked at the Black Cameron mine in Smiths Gully in 1973, at 60-90 Black Cameron Rd.
He moved on to the One Tree Hill mine in 1992, also in Smiths Gully, and retired in 2009.
Mr Bone said a practical-before-theory approach caused his career to start with a bang.
“You can go to university and learn the theory from books and be tutored and taught and then go out in the big wide world and do the practical — or you can do what I did and start from the practical in which case the theory becomes redundant — but that doesn’t necessarily apply to brain surgeons and pilots,” he said.
But he encountered his biggest challenge leaving the job he adored for so long.
“I had to give up physically, it’s horrible to reach a stage in life then to turn around and realise you can’t do it any longer. Especially being my livelihood, but fortunately it saw me through,” he said.
“I felt great underground — down there I felt protected, up here I’m vulnerable. It’s amazing how much I felt I was born to do this.”
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Despite collecting scores of gold in his stellar career, Mr Bone said the real prize was his life story he could now share with others.
“I say to young people, when you reach a good, ripe old age you must have a story to tell,” he said.
“You need a story to tell not only to share with others, but it’s important for yourself to have a story to tell.
“There will come a day when you sit on the veranda with a glass of wine or a stubby and go through everything you’ve done in life — and you want it to be bloody good.”
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