Maxie Anderson was one of the pioneers of his time, with personal and professional achievements illustrating his willingness to venture into the unknown. Whether crafting innovative technologies or reaching lofty heights and distances in ballooning, he searched for the new and the different.
Born in Oklahoma, he was graduated by the Missouri Military Academy—and educated in the “School of Hard Knocks” of his family's construction business and prospecting near the Arctic Circle. He was experienced in the business world well before he graduated in Industrial Engineering from the University of North Dakota in 1956.
One year later, he was appointed to the Board of Ranchers Exploration and Development Corporation, and in six years was made President and CEO of this firm. Ranchers, initially structured as a uranium royalty company, used the royalty base to become one of the most forward-thinking mining companies in the industry.
Maxie’s risk-taking led to the first commercial development of copper dump leaching, followed by solvent extraction-electrowinning of cathode copper (SX-EW). From the small copper heap leach precipitation facility at the Bluebird Mine near Globe, Arizona, this new technology was spawned. The method is now used by mining companies around the globe. Ranchers’ next coup was the highly profitable Big Mike Mine, from which shipping ore was mined with unprecedented speed for direct shipment to foreign smelters. Subsequently, the first and largest blast and in-situ leach operation in the world was created at the Old Reliable Mine in Arizona. Here tunnels that penetrated the deposit were loaded with four million pounds of explosives and detonated in the largest non-nuclear blast of all time, with the broken ore leached in place. This project was followed by several other mining operations that produced uranium, silver, and industrial minerals.
Always seeking efficiency and the better way, Maxie was equally creative in management and business practices. He installed profit-sharing programs, employee empowerment activities, hedging techniques, and innovative financing approaches. Dividend payments of physical gold and silver bars, and the borrowing of bullion for mine financing, were but a few of the new ideas he implemented. This creative work environment allowed the company to make mines from the smaller, lower grade ore deposits that were deemed uneconomic by the major producers. He was “Copper Man of the Year” in 1979.
Maxie, a pilot from his teens, was drawn to ballooning. On a second attempt, he successfully crossed the Atlantic Ocean, landing in France on August 17, 1978 in the specially designed balloon, Double Eagle II. He lost his life in a balloon accident in Germany in 1983, leaving behind an outstanding record of business, mining, and personal accomplishments.
