Boart Longyear wireline core retrieval system, an innovation that revolutionized the diamond drilling industry by increasing productivity on the worksite and making tripping core from the bottom of the hole safer for the drilling assistant. Later named the Q Wireline System, the new core retrieval method introduced a level of productivity never before seen in the exploration drilling industry. In 1964 Longyear sold 25 percent of its family-owned stock to FACTS, a Luxembourg-based holding company owned jointly by Boart International and Christensen Diamond Products Company. Three years later FACTS exercised its option to purchase another 25 percent of Longyear's family stock. The
Things Ain't What They Used to Be Things Ain't What They Used to Be "Things Ain't What They Used to Be" is a 1942 jazz standard with music by Mercer Ellington and lyrics by Ted Persons. In 1941 there was a strike against the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, of which Duke Ellington was a member. Because of the strike he could not air his songs on the radio. Instead, he used songs written by his son Mercer and pianist Billy Strayhorn. Strayhorn's compositions of this time include "Take the 'A' Train", "Chelsea Bridge" and "Day Dream". Mercer wrote "Things Ain't What They Used to