James Aubrey Simmons (1897 - 1979)
Aubrey Simmons was a son of Leo Simmons. He arrived in the Yukon from Revelstoke, British Columbia when he was four years old.1) He was working as a telegraph operator in Carcross in 1916 when he joined the Canadian military to serve in the First World War.2) He was wounded returned north to become a telegraph operator at Teslin and then collector of customs in Whitehorse.3) In 1949, Simmons was elected to the Canadian Parliament for the Yukon-Mackenzie district that included past of the NWT west of Yellowknife. He was a Liberal and he held the Yukon seat until 1957 when he lost to Conservative Eric Neilson. In the 1958 by-election he lost again, this time by 600 votes. Simmons moved to Vancouver in 1959 but always retained a strong interest in the north.4)
Bob Lowe's widow spent some time picking up the more important Crown mineral claims in the copper belt. She got them for back taxes and held them with a nominal yearly sum. Everyone thought she was crazy. The estate went to her nephew Ben Hillman, and his friend Aubrey Simmons developed a company and promoted the stock.5)
Simmons was president of the New Imperial Mines in 1966 when they opened a mine that became the Whitehorse Copper Mine. He was involved in the Arctic Gold and Silver Mines Ltd. near Carcross in 1968.6) He and his backers purchased the two crown granted claims that John Phelps and John Scott owned on top of Montana Mountain. These were the key claims of the old Big Thing property. They staked other claims around them and organized a company called the Arctic Mines Ltd. They erected a mill and put the mine into production, but the ore body was not there and the mine closed.7)