Golden Dawn Purchases Processing Facility and Budgets Rehabilitation of Historic Mines Located on the Greenwood Precious Metal Project, British Columbia

TSX-V:  GOM
FRANKFURT EXCHANGE: 3G8

VANCOUVER, May 29, 2012 /PRNewswire/ - Golden Dawn Minerals Inc. (TSX-V: GOM; FRANKFURT: 3G8) (the "Company" or "Golden Dawn") is pleased to announce that it has acquired from Mineworks Ventures Inc. (Mineworks), a 130 tonne-per-day permitted processing facility and adjacent tailings pond located on the Boundary Falls Property for a consideration of a royalty of $5 per tonne of material processed. The facility is accessed via Trans-Canada Highway #3, two kilometers (km) west of the City of Greenwood and via a 2 km secondary road on the Boundary Falls Property.  The facility has all infrastructure including power and water, located within 100 meters (m) of the number 7 adit of the historic May Mac Mine, which is located on the Boundary Falls Property.

The Boundary Falls Property, along with the contiguous Wild Rose and Tam O'Shanter Properties cover an area of around 3,000 ha, and are collectively called the Greenwood Precious Metal Project. The historic Wild Rose Mine Portal is located on the Wild Rose Property, 2 km north of the historic May Mac Mine and the associated processing facility.

Boundary Falls - May Mac Mine and Proposed Exploration Work

The historic May Mac Mine is located on the Boundary Falls property, near Greenwood, British Columbia at latitude 49°03'36" N and longitude 118°42'23" W. The property is held under an option agreement between Golden Dawn (the optionee) and Mineworks (the optionor). The mill and tailings pond are located on Land Tenure number 516278, which covers an area of 254 hectares, over the northern portion of the Boundary Falls Property in the Boundary District, British Columbia.

The property is host to a multitude of quartz veins carrying gold (Au), silver (Ag) and base metals, the majority of which lie within a fault-bounded and deformed block of argillite, serpentinite and greenstone measuring up to 200 m wide and over 1,200 m long. The veins run parallel to (and appear to be associated with) a fault to the north, which separates the favorable belt from a diorite intrusion. The property is almost entirely covered by a thin mantle of overburden and although in excess of ten veins have been located to date, almost all historic development has been restricted to just two principal veins.

Underground mining has been conducted intermittently since 1894 on the two vein systems over a partially-developed length of some 470 m.  Total lateral underground development exceeds 1,000 m.  Total historic production to date is reported to be in the range of 3,400 tonnes (3,750 tons), averaging 5.16 grams per tonne (g/t) Au (0.15 ounce per ton [oz/ton]), 236 g/t Ag (6.88 oz/ton), 1.5% lead (Pb), and 1% zinc (Zn).  Approximately half of the historic production was directly shipped without pre-concentration, and the other half processed on-site as a flotation concentrate.  All production was shipped to the COMINCO smelter, some 180 km away.   The property currently contains no National Instrument (NI) 43-101 compliant mineral reserve or mineral resource.

The property has been inactive since the mid 1980's. Previous exploration and mining activities appear to have been chronically under-funded, with work being conducted on a shoe-string basis. Many areas of obvious potential have not been followed up. In all, the property has never been more than cursorily explored. A budget of $650,000 is recommended as a Phase I underground exploration program, to include mine rehabilitation, underground mapping, sampling and underground drilling. This program will give a strong indication as to the property's potential to host a small narrow vein mining operation.

One month into the exploration and rehabilitation work of the May Mac adits, the company will submit an application to collect a 10,000 tonne bulk sample to be mined out of the historic May Mac Mine and an application to collect a 10,000 tonne bulk sample from the historic Wild Rose Mine. The intention is to have the bulk sample permits in hand towards the end of 2012, coinciding with the completion of the Phase I underground exploration program at the May Mac Mine.

Wild Rose - Tam O'Shanter -Wild Rose Mine and Proposed Exploration Work

The historic Wild Rose Mine is located 2 km north of the May Mac Mine site on the contiguous Wild Rose -Tam O'Shanter Properties. The historic Wild Rose Mine has a 350 m modern development, intersecting the Wild Cat vein and is about 12 m from intersecting the Wild Rose vein at the head of the development.  Both veins have yielded high grade gold-copper intersections in recent and historic drilling. Numerous surface drill holes have intersected potential strike extents of the the Wild Rose and Wild Cat veins up to approximately 1,000 m northwest from the portal of the Wild Rose Mine. Recent and historic diamond drill holes may also have intersected what may be a number of parallel trending veins along this strike. The Company proposes a budget of $150,000 to rehabilitate the Wild Rose adit and conduct limited underground drilling and exploration at the conclusion of the Phase 1 underground exploration work at the historic May Mac Mine.  The program at the historic Wild Rose Mine is expected be completed by the end of November 2012.

After the conclusion of the evaluation of the data obtained from the Phase 1 exploration program of the historic May Mac and Wild Rose Mines, a decision will be undertaken as to whether to collect a 10,000 ton bulk sample from the May Mac Mine or Wild Rose Mine or from both mines simultaneously.    The Company will be able to prepare budgets for the bulk tonnage sampling of the May Mac Mine and Wild Rose Mine once the data for the underground exploration programs have been evaluated.

The company is currently in negotiation with experienced and competitive Peruvian mining contractors, with skilled high grade narrow vein jackleg miners.

Conclusions

In conclusion, for a budget of approximately $800,000 and by the end of this year, the Company will have sufficient exploration data and permits in hand to determine if the collection of a bulk sample of 10,000 tonnes at either the historic May Mac and/or the Wild Rose mines is warranted and is feasible. In addition, insight will be gained into the feasibility of and whether the rehabilitation of the existing permitted processing plant and tailings pond is warranted. If bulk sampling is warranted at one or both historic mines, the intent will be to proceed to bulk sampling in order to evaluate if sufficient ore with economic grades are contained in either vein system in order to commence underground narrow vein mining. These programs and the continuation of drilling at the Dead Wood Bulk Tonnage Zone, with a view to expand and upgrade its resource, are subject to financing.

There are currently no known mineral reserves or resources at the historic May Mac or Wild Rose Mines. However there is a NI 43-101 compliant inferred resource at the Dead Wood Gold Zone, 400 m to the north-west of the Portal of the Wild Rose Mine, of 279,300 troy oz. of gold grading 0.45 g/t (See the Company's news release of July 13, 2011).  This resource will be updated in the near future to include the results of the fall 2011 drill program at the Dead Wood Gold Zone, which straddles the Wild Rose and Tam O' Shanter Properties.

Mike Dufresne, P.Geo, M.Sc., of Apex Geoscience Ltd. and Wayne Ash, P.Eng., of Ash & Associates Consulting Ltd., Qualified Persons under NI 43-101 have reviewed and approved the contents of this news release. 

On behalf of the Board of Directors:
GOLDEN DAWN MINERALS INC.

"Wolf Wiese"______
Wolf Wiese
President/ Chief Executive Officer

THIS PRESS RELEASE WAS PREPARED BY MANAGEMENT WHO TAKES FULL RESPONSIBILITY FOR ITS CONTENTS. NEITHER TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE NOR ITS REGULATION SERVICES PROVIDER (AS THAT TERM IS DEFINED IN THE POLICIES OF THE TSX VENTURE EXCHANGE) ACCEPTS RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ADEQUACY OR ACCURACY OF THIS RELEASE. THIS DOCUMENT CONTAINS CERTAIN FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS WHICH INVOLVE KNOWN AND UNKNOWN RISKS, DELAYS, AND UNCERTAINTIES NOT UNDER THE COMPANY'S CONTROL WHICH MAY CAUSE ACTUAL RESULTS, PERFORMANCE OR ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE COMPANY TO BE MATERIALLY DIFFERENT FROM THE RESULTS, PERFORMANCE, OR ACHIEVEMENTS IMPLIED BY THESE FORWARD LOOKING STATEMENTS. WE SEEK SAFE HARBOR.

SOURCE Golden Dawn Minerals Inc.