Shoestring Finances

In his May 1936 letter hiring Harry Everard, Robert Fitzsimmons wrote:

As mentioned in my last letter our finances make it necessary to erect as cheap a job as possible “and yet do the work.” This can be decided after you come here. The one thing sure is that we are going to build some kind of refinery this summer. We are going to expand into mass production as fast as conditions warrant thereafter.

Correspondence between the two, after Everard started work at Bitumount, continues the same theme. The construction of living quarters made use of second-hand materials, such as windows, and considerable attention was paid to the planting of and caring for gardens to help feed staff at the plant.

In July 1937, Everard noted problems arising from having to build equipment from scratch, or deal with break-downs on the spot:

The sand conveyor has no two laps the same size, some touching the box while others are out at least two inches, with the result a small stone, only an inch in diameter, will get lodged between the lap and the box and stop the conveyor. If the conveyor had been a factory instead of a welding job, we would not have had any trouble in this manner. The drive sprocket at the upper end split and we spent half a day installing another which we had here.

In September 1938, an engineer wrote an evaluation of the plant as it then stood. Among a number of other comments, he noted:

A pertinent criticism can be made of the purchase of obsolete and inefficient pumping units. The writer is informed that none of these were in an operating condition when delivered to the site. Considerable repairs were necessary before they could be placed in commission, and have been the cause of unnecessary expense, and consequent halting of operations ever since.

It is remarkable that Fitzsimmons was able to accomplish anything at all with his limited resources. In the end, the demands of the task outstripped his ingenuity and determination. There was not enough money to pay the workers, let alone make improvements to the plant, and the operation was shut down in late 1938.