Stockgreed - simple answer

Luck!

Just like smith getting into ROF - he picked the piece of property that Nemis was offering around in hope work would start by other companies.

As for Magpie - Soquiem worked on this years ago and stopped and then lost site of the inventory and claims came open when they didn't do the requisite work to maintain them.

Peter happened to notice this and staked it... pure and simple luck.

wait for the visuals on the holes... nothing but good news i am hearing.