Toyo Masushita

Toyo Masushita learned to mine in the Klondike and worked underground at Keno Hill. He was the only Japanese prospector in the Elsa district around 1950. He had been a big powerful man but was by that time stooped with arthritis. He had a cabin on two or three claims at the east end of Galena Hill. He mined, following a narrow streak of silver-lead mineralization that was too small to be of interest to the company. He recovered a few sacks of high-grade ore every month and the company shipped it to the smelter for him. He earned an adequate income for his modest needs and was one of the few old-timers who was self-supporting.¹⁾