PROFILE (September 09, 1991)

By and large 1991 has been a dismal year for the mining industry. Metal prices are low while risk capital is rare. Agnico-Eagle Mines, however, reported a net profit of $846,000 for the second quarter, compared with a loss of $3.8 million in the same period of last year. Greater output from the LaRonde gold mine in Quebec partly accounts for the turnaround.

The bad news is Noranda Inc.’s dispute with Agnico over the Dumagami property, where LaRonde is located, remains unresolved. As well, Agnico’s Eagle and Telbel gold mines, in production since 1974 and 1984 respectively, are beginning to show signs of aging.

Despite the challenges, President Paul Penna remains optimistic. “I feel all that is needed is higher prices for gold, silver and base metals,” he told The Northern Miner in a recent interview. He indicated that Agnico’s silver division at Cobalt, Ont., inactive since 1989, could resume operations at a silver price of $10 an oz.

Will he continue to be lucky? “I kept the company alive by myself,” he said. “Luck is infatuated with the efficient. You make your own luck.” Born Dec. 7, 1922, in Toronto, Penna was expelled from high school “for sneaking off to the golf course,” he says.

As a caddy in the late 1930s, he served rich mining executives on the golf course and had a vicarious taste of success, to which he aspired. He then worked as a stock broker (1945-49) before entering the mining industry, and in 1953 married Lorraine. As milestones in his life, he cites “reviving the historic silver town of Cobalt” in the 1960s and building the Eagle and Telbel mines in Quebec’s Joutel Twp. into leading producers. Some see Penna as the patriarch of Agnico-Eagle who treats his staff as an extended family. He takes a personal interest in his employees’ welfare and in return expects unequivocal loyalty. Those who prefer keeping their private and professional lives separate may appreciate a more impersonal working environment. But those who choose to stay are his ardent supporters. As for Penna, he wants to domesticate his office. “Work is an extension of my home,” he says. “The workplace is not a jail.”

As expected, he treats Agnico’s shareholders as part of his extended family. “(They) flock to his annual meeting year after year,” wrote Maurice Brown, who was editor of The Northern Miner when it named Penna as The Mining Man of the Year in 1985. “Indeed they phone him day and night — and are never given the brush-off.”

Adds an observer who attended the annual meetings: “Penna dislikes outsiders.” Penna has handpicked two heirs to continue the Agnico tradition. They are Wencel Hubacheck, his longtime consulting geologist, and John Clement, current vice-president of Agnico and Ontario’s attorney-general in 1974-75.