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Anyone Know Ben Thompson ?


DolanDave

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On 3/2/2019 at 6:28 PM, jasong said:

New technology is great, but a backhoe in just the right place can be just as good when most the surface stuff is gone.

Thanks Jason, it was good seeing ya last weekend. I wish I had a mentor when I first started, I havent been gold hunting as long as others here, only 17 years. I learned myself, and it was a year before I got my first piece. When I'm to old to do it anymore, Im gonna write everything, with locations for examples, and the research I've done, where I went, and what I found along the way.... 

  Love the idea on the backhoe, and would love to throw the GPR in there for those deep bedrock dips ?... 

 Kick ass out there, oh and we like those videos ?.

Dave.

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I got this manual at a swap meet in Quartzsite, Arizona. It's a manual written by Ben Thompson, 

Have you had a chance to read it?   How was it if you did?   I have a feeling it would get the brain going.

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2 hours ago, Swegin said:

Have you had a chance to read it?   How was it if you did?   I have a feeling it would get the brain going.

Hi Swegin, 

  Yes read the manual. A lot of good info in there. He talks a lot about his adventures, starting since a young age with his dad in the depression era, to late 90's when he published. Would love to see more history published from the guys been doing this 30+ years. I love reading Steve Herschbach's adventures here on the forum, and from others. 

Dave

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  • 1 month later...

I learned a lot from Ben. Look at the picture with the screen on his drywasher. Most everyone uses the expanded metal that's on most production dry washers. Ben used a 1/4 screen  to get better fine gold recovery. He would check his tailings with an old whites gold master when he was done.

 

DSCF0330.JPG

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I knew Ben, he also spent some time around Quartzsite in his latter yrs. First met him drywashing near Downieville ebout1990.

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1 hour ago, Hobo said:

I knew Ben, he also spent some time around Quartzsite in his latter yrs. First met him drywashing near Downieville ebout1990.

could you elaborate on this? the thing that got me to join a particular club was seeing one of their members drywashing next to the yuba river several years ago.

 

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  • 2 months later...

What a cool thread Dave. Years ago I too was the recipient of someone's kindness (and patience), when I was learning. Actually I had a mentor in dredging and then later another teacher with a detector. That instruction came full circle years later and led to one of my best moments when I was able to turn someone on to their first piece of gold after they had been detecting without any luck for more than 8 years.

We are all better for sharing our hard-won knowledge. You don't have to give away your best sites but sharing information on detecting and prospecting methods is so easy when you get right down to it, and there is no better feeling than seeing someone take what you have given, learn from it and pass it on. Don't think we'll ever know as much as some of those amazing old timers though. The knowledge that dies with them will never be reclaimed. They simply do not make people like that much any more. Just think what they could have done with a 7000 in their day.

Thanks again Dave (and everyone else).

 

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