** Lost Gold At The Dead Man's Mine ** A Miners Journal **

[klunker]

49 minutes ago, GhostMiner said:

Lee Marvin would be my pick

 Lee Marvin was also a gold miner. he had an interest in and financed the Sunnyside mine west of a mining camp called Seneca on the north fork of the Feather River. There was a rough little tavern in Seneca where Lee did most of his mining.

[GhostMiner]

   AUGUST 4   1936

   This morning Whiskey Jack did the honors and weighed up another 4 ounces. He is encouraging us to continue working hard and thinks the jackpot awaits us. He came into the drift with us and did an inspection and said the roof is stable. He told us to work like the devil and get the gold out. He said this is our time and we will likely never see gold like this again. We continued to move out gravels bucket by bucket at a steady pace. The test pans continue to look rich. We stopped work before dark and ended our long day with 219 buckets. 

   Down at camp everyone is in a good mood and spirits are high. Jack keeps us entertained with his stories of the old days. Sarge and Ben have had an easy time of it lately with no hooligans around. The word is probably out that we are not to be messed with. I am hoping things will remain this way for the rest of the season. John says when he gets back home he is going to use some of his gold to pay for a new barn and several work horses. Jacob and Will now want to stay in the area and buy a ranch. As for me, I plan to keep mining. I am hoping to work these claims until my body gives out.

   TO BE CONTINUED ..............

[GhostMiner]

9 minutes ago, klunker said:

 Lee Marvin was also a gold miner. he had an interest in and financed the Sunnyside mine west of a mining camp called Seneca on the north fork of the Feather River. There was a rough little tavern in Seneca where Lee did most of his mining.

I didn't know that. Very interesting.

[Cascade Steven]

I'm with the crowd on this one - PLEASE don't stop posting.  I try to give as many likes as I can and I too really appreciate the fact that you are posting this diary and expending all of the effort to transcribe it.  It is truly a labor of love and we too (all of the readers represented by the 59.9k views on Steve's view counter) love it.  Best Wishes. 🙂

[GhostMiner]

8 minutes ago, Cascade Steven said:

I'm with the crowd on this one - PLEASE don't stop posting.  I try to give as many likes as I can and I too really appreciate the fact that you are posting this diary and expending all of the effort to transcribe it.  It is truly a labor of love and we too (all of the readers represented by the 59.9k views on Steve's view counter) love it.  Best Wishes. 🙂

Not stopping. Just a comment about social media which I am not used to LOL. No worries.

[GhostMiner]

 AUGUST 5   1936

   Once again we had Whiskey Jack weigh up the gold this morning and saw 7 ounces. We were all happy but no one was happier than Jack. He was hopping up and down and threw his hat in the air. We all had a good laugh before we went to work. Jack came up to the drift with us and was offering advice before we went back in. He was saying to drive in a solid bar if we hit stubborn gravel and rock. Then sledge against the bar side to side to break things up. Once loosened then swing the pick. I tried it and it seemed to work ok and from then on rather than beating the pick over and over against a stubborn wall we used Jack’s method. 

   Eventually we started to encounter more solid material and the drift curled to the southeast. We were well into the fault and beginning to drift in a somewhat lateral direction but still going in on an angel. There were no large rocks or boulders to move, just gravel and small rounded rock. I broke some of the wall down and encountered a sloping area that contained mostly gravel and was on a grade of about 30 degrees. I started digging out some of it for a test pan. It was rich. Jacob and me were in there banging away at it and it contained the entire width of tunnel which was about 7 feet. We were digging it out and following the natural feature down. The roof of the drift did not drop with it so we were gaining in headroom. I could now stand straight up in the tunnel. After several hours I took another sample pan. It was full of course gold. Jack was hollering out encouragement and saying we were finding the big pot. By quitting time we had dropped about 4 feet and no sign of a bottom. We were slowed a bit but still ended the day with 162 buckets. I think they are the richest of this drift to date and tomorrow will tell if I am correct.

  TO BE CONTINUED ....................

[Pogo]

I generally don’t. But now you’ve mentioned it I’m hitting the likes for you.

 

Cracking tale, loving every post

[Muppet]

Sometimes I forget to like, as I'm scrolling forwards to see if you posted another entry..

[GhostMiner]

11 hours ago, Muppet said:

Sometimes I forget to like, as I'm scrolling forwards to see if you posted another entry..

Well you sure made up for it all at once LOL.

[GhostMiner]

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