Ghost Towns Of The Gold Road (1952)

single thoroughfare has witnessed more dauntless courage heartbreaker romantic than the gold road of California for this was the highway of high adventure the path of the 49ers the gold run the road it was a term it was the American River tumbling through the ages of the Sierras offering gold and treasures in one spot nothing out lives in another it was a giant redwood the old and things in the world guarding the entrance to the Mariposa far a reminder to those of the first great migration in American history the gold road was made of the huge straight of glistening courts like this offering fortunes to the first men who would swing a pick to the end of the rainbow and when the gold was gone they left to secure richer field leaving in their wake the ghost Collins of the gold road the gold road led through such towns as big oak flats which had many blacksmith shops namitha prices with big oak flat also voted a real a people for the famed Wells Fargo Express almost every stream had great water wheels along the shoreline to feed the sluice boxes of the miners some of these wheels are still standing is reminded of the fact the eternal silence of the virgin forest high in the Sierra Nevadas was broken by the noisy woodsman chopping trees to be used as shoring Timbers for the mines and for the towns and cities which sprang up in isolated creeks and Kenya the gold road with raw direct way of life for instance an alleged horse thief was taken from this cell in hang later it was discovered that someone else had stolen the horse and the unlucky victims grave was decorated with the epitaph by mistake the joke's not it was here too that a minister presented the lynching of at least one innocent person who was suspected of trying to set the town on fire the parson proved the man was only trying to light his fight was the untamed of boom town of rough and ready run by one man who would greet the stagecoach register the guests distribute the mail for the drinks and deal the cards a toll was charged from this very house upon every man woman and child for the privilege of passing through the town when the United States Marshal challenged their authority the citizens threatened to secede from hebron state of rough and ready the now quiet village of placerville was once the liveliest and wildest town along the gold road and bore the name of Hangtown bands of Outlaws virtually took over almost outnumbering the lawful citizens this sawed-off shotgun was carried by the stagecoach guard on the hang town to Virginia City run and these notches on its handle are proof that it was used many times to protect the gold shipment finally every townsmen went armed with a six-gun lynchings became a daily routine and thus Hangtown got its name you but the gold road saw activities others and lynchings and flogging panning and sluicing it saw John M Studebaker one of the early settlers of Hangtown start a fortune by making his wheel barrel this is the original as many wheelbarrows which Studebaker built for the miners during his stay in Hangtown he stuck to his trade instead of mining for gold the money he made from building wheelbarrows later enabled him to open his wagon and buggy factory at South Bend Indiana with the same force right that Studebaker showed when he opened his little wheel barrel shop he later saw the possibilities of the horseless carriage and began the manufacture of the automobile which still bears his name in 1851 two years after the first gold strike on the Yuba River more than 10,000 miners were working and living in an area less than three miles square this amazing growth was due to rich surface deposits gold was everywhere the miners were so ruthless in their search that even the streets of Nevada City were torn up one prospectors tried to stake the main street as his claim as the wealth of Nevada City increased the tents and cabins which housed the miners were replaced by large and important looking house this amazing transformation was paid for by gold from these mines which extended in every direction since many of these Gold Rush homes were built by man of little culture they followed no architectural pattern and only rivaled each other in their side often a man would enlarge his home by building another close by and connecting it by means of a balcony or a stairway although most of these homes are in ruins today their windows once were draped with fine curtains and they were ablaze with light while outside and the rumble of wagon wheels of an endless train of hopeful settlers moved westward in 1859 history was made in this office the sayers examined a pizza for which marked the discoveries of fabulous Comstock Lode one of the world's greatest Gold Strike many houses in Nevada City were built of stone or dobby with heavy iron doors to protect him from fire it was thought that stone and iron would make the building's fire proof until three men made the mistake of staying indoors during a blade when the fire had burned itself out it was discovered the brick walls and iron door had made a perfect oven and the men had been roasted alive North San Juan was founded by a Dutchman given a Spanish name and settled largely by Germans and Irish these few scattered buildings scarcely suggest that this city once boasted the population of 20,000 people in this old firehouse is an ancient hose cart on the day it arrived a holiday was declared and several thousand people joined in the celebration to the proud miners garland it with flowers and carried through the streets of the town here as in the other towns of this area architecture with ornate and expensive hand wrought iron railings were used extensively one of the earliest mining camps was the nearby city of auburn after the first gold strikes in 1848 ford's of miners and adventures poured into the camp and a city of 15,000 sprang up in an election of 1850 Auburn became the seat of Sutter County five roads led into Auburn and they all ended at Main Street there in the saloons such as the union bar the stage drivers mule Skinner's and Teamsters stops to wash the trail dust from the soap not far from auburn is the Bailey house of pilot hill Alexander Bailey spent a fortune to make it one of the finest hotels in the West and it became the showplace of the district strangely enough jackass Hill was probably the cultural center of Californians live Billy Gillis syrup truthful James and Bret Hart's famous story Tennessee's partner where the gold road twisted and turned a long mountainous crest there occurred the greatest single tragedy of that era I on Donner Pass is this monument work 44 out of 85 members of the Donner Party perished from cold and hunger while the survivors huddled together in troub cabins built on the flat when the spring thaws released the snowbound prisoners the nation was shocked to hear of their fate but countless thousands of other hopefuls immediately set out to follow the same trail because it led to California's gold so Donner Pass tahoe and Donner Lake with its shimmering jewel-like Beauty took their place along with the remains and ruins of the mining camps ghost town of the gold rose I