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Gold
Mining and Metals
American History
North Carolina
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 3
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Neil Young - After The Gold Rush
From After The Gold Rush (1970) --------------------------------------------- AFTER THE GOLD RUSH Well, I dreamed I saw the knights In armor coming, Saying s...
Thank you my friend CW5 Jack Cardwell for sharing the video focused on the first gold rush in the USA. "There's gold in them thar hills" comes to mind about the Gold Rush in North Carolina.
Background from goldfever.unctv.org/history
"The Beginnings Of NC’s Gold Rush
'In 1799, 12-year-old Conrad Reed pulled a 17-pound yellow rock out of Little Meadow Creek in Cabarrus County, not far from Charlotte, North Carolina. For the next three years, it made a useful doorstop at the Reed home.'
The discovery of a 17-pound gold nugget in Cabarrus County, NC in 1799 marks the beginning the North Carolina Gold Rush. Twelve-year-old Conrad Reed found the treasure in the waters of Little Meadow Creek and took it home where it was used as a doorstop for three years. In 1802, the boy’s father, farmer John Reed, took the rock to a jeweler in Fayetteville who confirmed that it was gold and bought it for $3.50, later profiting a thousandfold.
Reed, soon realizing that he had been swindled, aligned himself with partners in a crude mining operation at the site of his son’s find. The men scoured the banks and sandbars of nearby rivers and streams using picks, shovels, pans and possibly a rudimentary rocker device to separate the heavy gold particles from the lighter sand and debris.
For 20 years following the discovery of gold on Reed’s farm, miners, many of whom were smalltime farmers, sifted through sand and gravel along NC’s streams and rivers. Because surface mining takes only simple equipment, a shovel and pan, or a crude rocker, prospectors came from all across the state as well as from surrounding areas to try their luck and seek their fortune.
Where’s The Gold?
By the early 1820s, the pursuit of gold in NC had become a major enterprise. In 1823, the state appointed Denison Olmsted, a faculty member at the University of North Carolina, as the first state geologist and commissioned him to conduct a geological survey to locate gold deposits and other valuable minerals. First Olmsted, and later German mining engineer Charles E. Rothe and then professor Elisha Mitchell, another faculty member from UNC, identified the main areas where gold occurred in the state. Additionally, Rothe and Mitchell produced reports for the state legislature and the American Journal of Science, fueling further interest in NC’s potential for gold mining.
In 1825, Mattias Barringer, another German whose farm was about 20 miles from the Reed farm, followed a vein of surface gold down to the gold-bearing rock. The Barringer Gold Mining Company was the first of many in the Charlotte area to try deep vein mining. Subsurface mining required far more equipment and technical skill than placer mining. Within a few years, dozens of companies had been formed to work the deeper gold deposits.
The discoveries and excitement continued to mount. Production increased as experienced miners and engineers arrived from European and South American mines. By 1832, more than fifty mines were operating in NC, employing more than 25,000 people. Next to farming, more people were employed in gold mining than in any other enterprise.
In 1837, English geologist George Featherstonhaugh visited several NC gold-mining operations between Rutherford and Mecklenburg Counties. He was distressed by the destruction of the land wherever placer mining was taking place, and observed that heedless removal of topsoil in the quest for gold ruined the land for future agricultural uses.
Problems Facing Miners & Prospectors
Although raw gold was abundant in NC, gold coins were not. Bartering was a common practice during America’s colonial and antebellum periods. The banking system was in chaos. State banks issued and recalled paper currency that was often inadequately backed with real assets. English and Spanish coins continued to circulate in the early 19th century with values that varied from place to place. Gold coins from the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia were rarely found in the South. Even silver and copper coins were rare.
Southern prospectors who were lucky enough to find gold had no reliable market for it. The only U.S. Mint was in Philadelphia - a long, dangerous journey away. There were few roads and fewer bridges. Travel was uncomfortable and unreliable. Much of the gold found by well-organized companies could be shipped through Charleston to Europe more reliably than it could be sent to Philadelphia.
U.S. Representative Samuel Price Carson, familiar with the problems facing southern gold miners, on several occasions introduced a resolution to secure a U.S. mint in the mining region of the Carolinas. One of his chief arguments was the hazard and inconvenience of transporting gold from NC to the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia. Carson’s bill, however, was buried in committee. It was not until 1835 that Congress approved construction of branch mints in Charlotte, NC, Dahlonegah, GA, and New Orleans, LA. The Charlotte Mint opened in 1837 and began minting coins in 1838."
Your post reminded me about Neil Young's song After the Goldrush from the album of the same name
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e3m_T-NMOs
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs LTC Orlando Illi Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. Maj William W. "Bill" Price CPT Jack Durish Capt Tom Brown CMSgt (Join to see) MSG Andrew White SFC William Farrell SGT (Join to see) Sgt Albert Castro SSG David Andrews Sgt Randy Wilber Sgt John H. SGT Charles H. Hawes SGT Mark Halmrast PO1 William "Chip" Nagel CPT Gabe SnellLTC Greg Henning
Background from goldfever.unctv.org/history
"The Beginnings Of NC’s Gold Rush
'In 1799, 12-year-old Conrad Reed pulled a 17-pound yellow rock out of Little Meadow Creek in Cabarrus County, not far from Charlotte, North Carolina. For the next three years, it made a useful doorstop at the Reed home.'
The discovery of a 17-pound gold nugget in Cabarrus County, NC in 1799 marks the beginning the North Carolina Gold Rush. Twelve-year-old Conrad Reed found the treasure in the waters of Little Meadow Creek and took it home where it was used as a doorstop for three years. In 1802, the boy’s father, farmer John Reed, took the rock to a jeweler in Fayetteville who confirmed that it was gold and bought it for $3.50, later profiting a thousandfold.
Reed, soon realizing that he had been swindled, aligned himself with partners in a crude mining operation at the site of his son’s find. The men scoured the banks and sandbars of nearby rivers and streams using picks, shovels, pans and possibly a rudimentary rocker device to separate the heavy gold particles from the lighter sand and debris.
For 20 years following the discovery of gold on Reed’s farm, miners, many of whom were smalltime farmers, sifted through sand and gravel along NC’s streams and rivers. Because surface mining takes only simple equipment, a shovel and pan, or a crude rocker, prospectors came from all across the state as well as from surrounding areas to try their luck and seek their fortune.
Where’s The Gold?
By the early 1820s, the pursuit of gold in NC had become a major enterprise. In 1823, the state appointed Denison Olmsted, a faculty member at the University of North Carolina, as the first state geologist and commissioned him to conduct a geological survey to locate gold deposits and other valuable minerals. First Olmsted, and later German mining engineer Charles E. Rothe and then professor Elisha Mitchell, another faculty member from UNC, identified the main areas where gold occurred in the state. Additionally, Rothe and Mitchell produced reports for the state legislature and the American Journal of Science, fueling further interest in NC’s potential for gold mining.
In 1825, Mattias Barringer, another German whose farm was about 20 miles from the Reed farm, followed a vein of surface gold down to the gold-bearing rock. The Barringer Gold Mining Company was the first of many in the Charlotte area to try deep vein mining. Subsurface mining required far more equipment and technical skill than placer mining. Within a few years, dozens of companies had been formed to work the deeper gold deposits.
The discoveries and excitement continued to mount. Production increased as experienced miners and engineers arrived from European and South American mines. By 1832, more than fifty mines were operating in NC, employing more than 25,000 people. Next to farming, more people were employed in gold mining than in any other enterprise.
In 1837, English geologist George Featherstonhaugh visited several NC gold-mining operations between Rutherford and Mecklenburg Counties. He was distressed by the destruction of the land wherever placer mining was taking place, and observed that heedless removal of topsoil in the quest for gold ruined the land for future agricultural uses.
Problems Facing Miners & Prospectors
Although raw gold was abundant in NC, gold coins were not. Bartering was a common practice during America’s colonial and antebellum periods. The banking system was in chaos. State banks issued and recalled paper currency that was often inadequately backed with real assets. English and Spanish coins continued to circulate in the early 19th century with values that varied from place to place. Gold coins from the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia were rarely found in the South. Even silver and copper coins were rare.
Southern prospectors who were lucky enough to find gold had no reliable market for it. The only U.S. Mint was in Philadelphia - a long, dangerous journey away. There were few roads and fewer bridges. Travel was uncomfortable and unreliable. Much of the gold found by well-organized companies could be shipped through Charleston to Europe more reliably than it could be sent to Philadelphia.
U.S. Representative Samuel Price Carson, familiar with the problems facing southern gold miners, on several occasions introduced a resolution to secure a U.S. mint in the mining region of the Carolinas. One of his chief arguments was the hazard and inconvenience of transporting gold from NC to the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia. Carson’s bill, however, was buried in committee. It was not until 1835 that Congress approved construction of branch mints in Charlotte, NC, Dahlonegah, GA, and New Orleans, LA. The Charlotte Mint opened in 1837 and began minting coins in 1838."
Your post reminded me about Neil Young's song After the Goldrush from the album of the same name
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1e3m_T-NMOs
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs LTC Orlando Illi Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. Maj William W. "Bill" Price CPT Jack Durish Capt Tom Brown CMSgt (Join to see) MSG Andrew White SFC William Farrell SGT (Join to see) Sgt Albert Castro SSG David Andrews Sgt Randy Wilber Sgt John H. SGT Charles H. Hawes SGT Mark Halmrast PO1 William "Chip" Nagel CPT Gabe SnellLTC Greg Henning
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PO3 Phyllis Maynard
LTC Stephen F. I did not know this history about my state. It is shameful how then and now many people faced and face swindlers who steal everything a person tries to secure for his/her family and descendants.
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SSgt Boyd Herrst
So what you waiting for PO3 Phyllis Maynard.. grab your pick and gear and head to the river !
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Maj Robert Thornton
Dahlonega Georgia, and the surrounding area also became an area of gold mining. There was also a mint established there.
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CPT Jack Durish
Don't forget Colorado. I researched much about the gold rush, especially in Breckenridge where the tavern owner was the bugler from the Charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War. And Alaska, another great Gold Rush where men walked up a stairway carved in the snow on the side of a mountain to reach the Yukon Territory
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