Primarily an oil company, named after the billionaire art collector J Paul Getty who nominally controlled just 11.44% of the company but effectively ran it (1), it has interests in Algeria, Australia, Canada, Ireland, Liberia, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Great Britain and elsewhere.

It started expanding into minerals - especially coal and uranium - from 1973 (2). Despite minerals making no significant contribution to Getty's earning, in mid-1981 it was still spending US$70M on the acquisition of a coal mine in Colorado, USA, and continued spending on worldwide mineral exploration projects (3).

Its partners in different projects have included Utah (BHP) at the La Escondida copper prospect in north-east Chile (1); Hanna Mining in a copper JV at Casa Grande, Arizona (4); Mitsubishi with which it has taken half shares in Mitsubishi Oil Co (2); Irish Base Metals (a Northgate subsidiary) with whom it undertook a US$6M base metals search in Eire (4) - it also paid US$38M to acquire 91 Northgate licences there (5); Comalco in JVs in the Officer Basin exploration (6); and it even entered a JV with Columbia Pictures, MV, Paramount and Twentieth Century Fox to run a new national subscription pay-TV network in the USA.

Getty's prime involvement in the nuclear industry is through uranium mining, but in 1968 it did take a stake in nuclear fuel reprocessing too (2).

Its prime uranium interest is currently the 35% it holds in the Jabiluka mine (Pancontinental Mining holding the other 65%) (7). Its share of reserves there comes to 19.2 million tons ore grading at 0.367% U3O8 (6).

Its uranium operations in the USA are concentrated on the Petrotomics mine near Shirley Basin, Wyoming. In 1980, this mine processed some 1700 tons a day of uranium ore (8). However, by early 1981 it had laid off 130 miners (about one third of the workforce) (9). By 1982, the mine was running at only half capacity (10).

In 1978, together with Mitsubishi, Getty (51%) announced a JV (North American Resources Co) to explore for uranium in the San Juan and McKinley area of New Mexico; production could start "in eight or ten years' time, after completion of U5$100M-worth of mining and refining facilities" (11).

In 1979, it entered a JV with Cleveland-Cliffs, Skelly Oil (merged with Getty in 1977) and Nuclear Resources to explore for uranium in the Powder River area of Wyoming (12).

In Canada, the company was exploring in the late '70s for uranium in the Annapolis Valley of Nova Scotia (13); it was also exploring in Saskatchewan (14). In the Kasmere Lake prospect in north-west Manitoba, Getty Minerals holds 33.5% along with Camflo and United Siscoe (15).

In Australia, Getty entered with 60% the Ashburton JV (along with Command Minerals, Nickelore, West Coast Holdings and ACM/Australian Consolidated Minerals) to explore for uranium in 70,000 square miles of the Pilbara Ashburton region of West Australia (a largely Aboriginal area) "using space satellite information for drilling targets" (16). Also in Australia, Getty Oil Development Co Ltd (ie Getty Mining) has a JV with Stellar Mining and Kratos Uranium on three silver-gold mines (17). It also searched in the Fingal Valley, Tasmania (18).

In the Philippines, Getty Oil received a concession to explore the Camarines Norte area for uranium in 1977 (19); an exploration development contract was to be signed by January 1978 (20). This JV appears to have been with Benguet Consolidated (21). Drilling started in June 1978 in the Camarines Norte area as well as elsewhere in the Philippines (22).

J Paul Getty tells it "as I see it":

"...I have no guilty feeling about being rich. On the other hand, if I thought that by giving 99 percent of my wealth to the poor or some government I would help abolish poverty and human ills, I would not hesitate to do so. But suppose I did, and every man, woman and child in the world received even as much as a dollar, what good would it do? The answer is, none - and I would have nothing left to invest in productive enterprises that filled certain human needs and requirements even while creating jobs and paying salaries and taxes" (23).

Here we learn how the late J Paul brushed shoulders with Onassis, Beaverbrook, the Duke of Windsor, Churchill, Chaplin, Nixon and many others.

He dates the formation of his empire to his father's purchase of "lot 50", an oil and gas lease on Osage (native American) land in Bartlesville Indian Territory, Oklahoma, at the turn of the century. After the oil boom, his path was firmly set for him to become the owner of four million shares of Getty Oil and sole trustee of the Sarah C Getty Trust with another eight million shares.

"I feel no qualms or reticence about likening the Getty Oil company to an 'Empire'," he writes, " - and myself to a 'Caesar"'. On the other hand he is implacably opposed to "Big Government" and has a good word for OPEC.

Reeking with homespun conservative homilies, Getty finally settles for Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg address as an earnest example of his own philosophy: "You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot help the wage-earner by pulling down the wagepayer ... You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich". (From the Gettysburg Address - of course!) (23).

As one of the 29 companies sued by Westinghouse in the cartel case in the late 70's, Getty Oil was charged with anti-trust practices. However in early 1981, Westinghouse settled out of court with Getty - the oil company giving the nuclear giant US$13M in cash (24).

In 1988 Total Resources (Canada) Ltd, a 73% subsidiary of Total-CFP (qv), acquired Getty Resources Ltd, which it merged with Total Erickson Resources Ltd and renamed Total Energold Corp (25).

Total Energold has been involved in a drilling programme for gold in the Tundra region north of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, Canada, (26) and with Davidson Tisdale Mines at the Tisdale gold property in Ontario (27).

In 1988 it was continuing to explore for uranium in northern Saskatchewan at the Russell Lake property, near Key Lake: its uranium exploration at the contiguous Taylor Lake property seems to have been abandoned that year (27).

Getty owns 49% of the Maureen uranium deposit with CCE/Central Coast Exploration (1). No field work was carried out on the deposit in 1981 or 1982 nor, it seems, since. Getty then said that if uranium markets improved, consideration would be given to an acid heap leach scheme.

SOURCE: "The Gulliver File - Mines, people and land: a global battleground" by Roger Moody.

Published in 1992 by Minewatch, 218 Liverpool Road, London Nl ILE, UK, and WISE-Glen Aplin, Po Box 87, Glen Aplin Q 4381, Australia.

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