In Martin Scoreses' 1986 movie about a pool hall hustler, the color of money is like the felt on a pool table, but at The Market Traders' special reception for GLR Resources last week in Atlanta, Georgia, the color of money was like a Brooklyn Post Road Pumpkin Ale.

One Midtown Kitchen
I received a special invite to this event from Andy Millette. Who is Andy Millette? He's the president of Galt Publishing and one of the energetic entrepreneurs behind The Market Traders site. Somewhere along the line, I must have dazzled him with enough of my free market diatribes to provoke him to ask me to write for him. Whether or not that was a wise entrepreneurial decision, time will tell, but as long as it gets me into private parties at chic restaurants, rubbing elbows with high net worth investors and highly intelligent financial advisers...well, I'm going to ride it for all it's worth.

Andy and his associates know how to put on an event. This was not your typical investment seminar held in a hotel ballroom with an open bar serving weak drinks, crackers and cheese. The venue was Atlanta's One Midtown Kitchen: leather wrapped tables, canvas- covered chairs, with khaki drapes separating you from the hoi polloi. Frankly, I felt under-dressed.

Andy's partner, Will Hinton, had made prior arrangements with one of One's managers, Eric, for a beer tasting paired with cheese, antipasto, and charcuterie. Don't know what charcuterie is? Neither did I. It's a French term for cooked meats. And they're delicious.

The Beer
The beers were phenomenal. I'm not a beer guy. I prefer wine, but these fermented starches were several cuts above the standard fare. The head chef came out and announced what we would be enjoying for the evening. A nice touch. We started with a Malheur Brut. I would have told you its a great light beer, but Eric's notes indicate that its "light and crisp with hints of lavender, cardamom and exotic spices." This was paired with Carr Valley Fontina, "a soft white cheese with both nutty and herbaceous qualities."

Next was a Brooklyn Local 1, which has a big sweet nose, malty with hints of coriander and wheaty esters. This was paired with a Cypress Grove Midnight Moon, a cheese that is aged for at least a year with a nutty and brown butter flavor with prominent hints of caramel.

I'm a New York expatriate in Atlanta, so in homage to my beloved City, I drank heartily from the Brooklyn Local 1 cup and did likewise with the following Brooklyn Post Road Pumpkin Ale. As they were serving this golden-colored ale, Bob Kasner of Global Resources Inc. began his presentation.

Where to Look for Gold
Bob is not a slick corporate investor relations guy. He's an old school Canadian prospector. He's self-deprecating, but don't let that fool you. He talks about having only a 12th grade education and not knowing much about finance, but when someone asked if his bonds were convertible, without missing a beat, he shot back, "No way! The hedge funds would short the hell out of the stock."

Bob has struck gold in Canada. Yes, literally. His method for finding gold makes a lot of sense: always look where someone else has already found it. About 20 years ago, Bob went looking near a small town in the northwest corner of Saskatchewan where gold was pulled from the Box and Athona mines back in the 1930s. The gold mining operations had shut down by the end of WWII, but uranium deposits were discovered shortly thereafter and in the early 1950s, a team of hardy souls put up some tents and founded what is now called Uranium City.

The Rise, Fall, and Rediscovery of Uranium City
Uranium City was a thriving mining town until 1982 when the Eldorado mine was shut down. It's the kind of place that can really capture your imagination, especially after a few glasses of beer and I was well into the fourth selection on our tasting menu, a Franziskaner hefe- weisse dunkel.

At it's peak, there were 3,500 inhabitants of Uranium City. When the mine closed the population dropped to 600 in less than a year. Now there's only about 100. One person who stayed was Dean Classen, the owner of the bulk fuel business in Uranium City.

Dean's father was a high school teacher and moved to Uranium City in 1966. He eventually started operating the bulk fuel business and Dean took it over from him.

I called Dean a few days after the GLR event to satisfy my curiosity about Uranium City. I had heard it was a ghost town overrun by bears and other wildlife. Dean doesn't see it that way. To him, it's a beautiful place where he grew up. He enjoys hunting and fishing and was quick to tell me that he got a moose this year.

Dean is busy too. When I first called, there was a lot working noise in the background and he said he'd have to call me back. I asked him where he got his fuel supplies and he told me they come by barge across Lake Athabasca in the summer. He prefers to get a shipment in the winter because the transportation costs across the ice roads make it cheaper. This is the intriguing thing about Bob Kasner's gold mine.

Ready for Business
Uranium City may be a stone's throw from the Northwest Territories, but it has a lot of infrastructure already built up from the earlier mining operations. There's an airport that was built for large cargo planes. There's a power line that needs only a little repair where some frustrated hunter used it for target practice. There's a post office, office buildings, and, of course, Dean's bulk fuel business.

This pre-existing infrastructure means Bob can keep his development costs down. According to the feasibility study Bob commissioned in 1995, he can produce 90,000 ounces of gold per year at an operating cost of $280 an ounce. With gold now hovering over $800 an ounce-- and anyone with a sound view knows it's going to break over a $1,000 eventually--this junior mining company is an excellent opportunity.

Last Call
One thing did concern me though. Another rumor I heard was that Uranium City was a dry town since the liquor board store closed up in 1983. One report said that you had to rely on bootleggers to procure a medicinal respite from the winter cold. This turned out to be an exaggeration. When I asked, "How does a guy get a drink up there?" Dean told me you merely have to order your poison and they fly it in. He said he actually preferred the "door-to-door" service rather than having to drive down to the liquor store.

Which reminds me...the final brew at The Market Traders' reception was a Unibroue Chambly Noire. This black malty beer hails from Quebec, not Saskatchewan, but hey...close enough for those of us living in Atlanta, GA. I'm not one to agree with much of anything John Maynard Keynes ever said, but the old reprobate got this one right: "Canada is a place of infinite promise. We like the people, and if one ever had to emigrate, this would be the destination...The hills, lakes and forests make it a place of peace and repose of the mind, such as one never finds in the U.S.A."

One more thing...Andy's legal guys say I need to let you know that GLR is an advertiser on The Market Trader's site. I need to tell you that GLR did not pay me to write about them. Nothing I've said should be construed as an investment recommendation, but if you are interested in investing, go visit the GLR Resources and Uranium City websites.