South Dakota

I always appreciate reader emails – that’s why I put my email address at the bottom of the column. This one came in recently and I just had to check it out, right away, because it was a great excuse to focus on an area I don’t know much about.

Dear Garret:

I am new to gold prospecting, and have limited computer skills, but I am planning a trip to the Black Hills. I saw your address in Gold Prospectors magazine -- any info/directions on where to mine the Internet for gold in South Dakota would be appreciated – thanks!

- Dean Dahlheimer, http://www.firstcityloghomes.com

Great question! First off, let’s take a look at historic mining in South Dakota, and get an idea of the location of the state’s major gold mining districts from USGS Professional Paper 610:

Figure 1. Principal gold mining districts of South Dakota all lie in the Black Hills area, at the western border with Wyoming. Click to enlarge the graphics.

Clearly, the best gold you’re going to get from this state is in Lawrence County and Pennington County. That’s the heart of the Black Hills. Custer County, to the south, is probably also in play, but not a strong contender. For that matter, it might make sense to check the drainages headed east from the Black Hills if you catch wind of a 100-year flood…

I went out to the South Dakota geology web page and found this relief map of the state:

Figure 2. Black Hills appear like a giant oval uplift on the western border of South Dakota in this relief map.

Now you can start to see the Black Hills, on the far western border, and what a significant mountainous region it truly is. And that drainage pattern isn’t too bad, either – I count about ten drainages that end up in the Missouri River.

Check the Claims Guide

First, before doing a lot of Internet searching, let’s check the GPAA Claims Guide and see what it says about South Dakota. According to the guide, gold was first discovered along French Creek in the Black Hills during Custer’s Expedition in 1874. The resulting influx of miners upset the Sioux, who had supposedly gained ownership of the Black Hills by treaty. Eventually, as most history buffs know, Custer was killed but won the war, and the area went back to public lands. The area’s big producer was the Homestake Mine, which eventually produced more than 30 million troy ounces of gold before closing.

The guide suggests the following placer opportunities:

For Lawrence County: ‘All streams, bench and terrace gravel deposits, including Deadwood, Whitewood, Gold Run, Bobtail, Blacktail, Spring, and Strawberry Gulches, plus Spearfish and Elk Creeks and their tributaries, around Deadwood. Squaw, Yellow, False Bottom, and Annie Creeks show promise. Blacktail and Sheeptail Gulches, and all other area streams and benches around Lead are worth checking. The Negro Hill district, including Sand Creek, Beaver Creek, and Bear Creek, shows gold. Also Potato, Negro, Poplar, Mallory, and other creeks and gulches should be checked.’

In Pennington County, try ‘Spring Creek, Rapid Creek, Castle Creek, and Battle Creek.’

In Custer County: ‘All stream, bench, and terrace gravel deposits, especially on French Creek, site of the first discovery, along the eastern slopes of the Black Hills, near Custer.’ So my earlier thoughts about Custer County need revising.

Here’s where your full GPAA membership pays off; there are four member claims in South Dakota, all in the Black Hills. In Pennington County, check out MIGG 1-4, comprising 80 acres near Rochford on Rapid Creek; also try the Mary Ann and Rainbow Claims nearby. Or, if your Harley is tuned up, check out a spot near Sturgis, known as the Husker #1 claim.

Given all that, an Internet search should at least verify what we know, plus provide answers about state rules and regulations. I like to get an idea of how many people I’m going to trip over, where the museums and camps are, etc. It’s the concept of “local color” that defines an area, so you know what to expect on your first visit to the region. Aerial photography is good, but I like to develop a complete appreciation for a spot so that the trip is more in the category of ‘verification’ rather than ‘discovery.’

Finding Gold in South Dakota

http://www.e-goldprospecting.com/html/finding_gold_in_south_dakota_.html

This is a comprehensive site that offers clues about finding gold in most states. For South Dakota, the site recommends these starting spots:

· Several Black Hills streams due west of Rapid City, from Custer in the South to Lead and Deadwood in the North area. An interesting area is Castle Creek, Hoodoo Gulch, Crooked Gulch, and Chinese Hill, all of which are near Mystic.

· You can look in Rapid Creek, which is located near Placerville and Rockerville, and are both southwest of Rapid City.

· Along the banks of French Creek in Custer County.

Mayhill Press

http://www.mayhillpress.com/wygold.html

Here’s what Mayhill Press says about South Dakota’s two noted gold-bearing counties, with an emphasis on hard-rock mining:

LAWRENCE: Bald Mtn District - 3 m West and SW from Lead, Mogul Mine.
.....Deadwood-Two Bit District - around Deadwood. Mostly from placers in Deadwood Gulch and the following creeks: Two Bit, Elk, Strawberry. Also Strawberry Gulch. Mines: Cloverleaf, Mascot.
.....Garden District - 1-3 miles N from Lead. Maitland mine - 3 miles NNW from Lead.
.....Lead District - at Lead. HOMESTAKE MINING COMPANY.
.....Squaw Creek District - 6 miles W from Lead. Includes Elk Mtn, Carbonate, Ragged Top areas. Placers at Squaw and Annie creeks. MORE MINES: Gold Reward - 2 miles SW from Lead; Wasp No 2 - 2 miles S. Gilt Edge - 5 miles ESE; Spearfish - 7 miles W; Uncle Sam - 7 miles SE; Lundberg, Door and Wilson - 2 miles WSW; Hoodoo-Union Hill - 5 miles ESE; Reliance - 5 miles W; Hidden Fortune - .5 mile N.

PENNINGTON: Hill City District - near headwaters of Spring Creek and around Hill City to the NW. JR mine - 3 miles NE from Hill City.
.....Keystone District - 1.5 miles SE to 3.5 miles NW from Keystone. Mines: Keystone-Holy Terror.
.....Rockerville Placer District - E from Rockerville.

So now you have the names of some hard rock mines to check as well as placer locales. I’ll leave the hard rock mining to concentrate on placer locales. Whenever I see a creek called “Two-Bit Creek” I know I want to try it. I’ve been on Ten Cent Creek in Oregon and recently spied “50-Cent Creek” in Wyoming.

Black Hills National Forest

http://www.fs.fed.us/bhnf

Check out the links to the US Forest Service map page, as there are lots of files to download and plenty of good information. This will give you ideas about camping in the area, too. You’ll probably want to order the Black Hills National Forest map if you plan to do any exploring at all; it’s practically a must-have.

Here’s what the Black Hills National Forest says about rockhounding, gold panning, and fossil collecting:

· Rock collecting in small amounts for personal use is allowed on the Forest. Make sure you surface collect only, with no digging or excavating.

· Recreational gold panning is allowed in some locations. Contact the closest Forest Service office for more information on locations and rules.

· Metal detectors are allowed, as long as you don't dig holes.

· Federal law prohibits the collection of fossils.

If I’m not mistaken, the last bullet about fossil hunting is new. Collecting non-vertebrate fossils used to be fine for amateurs. Also, what’s the point of metal detecting if you can’t dig a target? Just remind people to fill in their holes and move on!

Here’s the address:

Black Hills National Forest

Highway 385 Northg

Route 2, PO Box 200

Custer, SD 57730

(605) 673-2251

Geology Information

http://denr.sd.gov/linkslandnav.aspx

Check out links for abandoned mines (there’s a name and phone number if you want to contact the office about promising mine dumps) and links to geology maps. There is a nice section of web links at http://www.sdgs.usd.edu/other/webresources.html as well. You could spend a lot of time tracking down documents and links from this page. For example, the South Dakota University School of Mines and Technology is located at this address: http://sdmines.sdsmt.edu/sdsmt.

More Geology maps

http://www.sdgs.usd.edu/publications/general.html?limit_to_download=Yes&sql_option=7#g10

The maps on this page include a geology map for the entire state in PDF form, which you can zoom in on. There’s also a statewide topo map.

Figure 3. Note the ancient geology of the Black Hills, with an abundance of Precambrian rocks at the core.

Tourist Info

If you can plan far enough ahead, contacting a tourist-focused website can net you a full envelope of brochures about an area. If nothing else, I’d hate to miss a promising brew pub (Black Hills Brewing Co., 51 Sherman St. in Deadwood). Here are two tourist sites for the Black Hills area:

Deadwood

http://www.deadwood.org/

Request their brochure, entitled The Official Guide to Deadwood. Figure out where the gas stations, mini-marts, and taverns are situated. Check for museums and other attractions – especially if you have kids with short attention spans.

Lead

http://leadmethere.org

Lead is not all that far from Presidents Park, Deadwood, Mount Rushmore, Crazy Horse, Spearfish Canyon, Wind Cave, Jewel Cave, Custer State Park, and Devils Tower, to name a few sites. It would make an ideal vacation headquarters, as this site points out.

Gas Prices

Here’s a site I learned about during the big price run-up in 2008. Actually, it wasn’t just the prices I was worried about – just FINDING gas is often a challenge.

First off, you can add GasBuddy.com to your Google maps. I went to google.com and entered “gas prices” in the search box. The first link was to Google Maps, with easy instructions to add prices to the overlay. You can also go to http://www.gasbuddy.com to get the widget. I find this interface tough to use, but by clicking through I got to http://www.southdakotagasprices.com/Map_Gas_Prices.aspx and the map of “gas temperature” comes up. This is a graphical representation of where prices are red hot. The trick here is to set the time limit in the bottom right corner to “All Stations.” That way each gas station shows up, even if the reported information is “old.”

Google Earth hack

http://www.gearthhacks.com/dlfile10754/-Homestake-Gold-Mine,-South-Dakota.htm

I’ll just assume you already have Google Earth loaded, since it’s such a great tool for checking an area before you visit. Label this link under “advanced” Google Earth – it’s a user-created “hack.” This is pretty neat – if you already have Google Earth installed, click on the link for the .kmz file and you’ll bring up the Homestake Mine.

Amateur Geologist

http://www.amateurgeologist.com/roadside-geology-of-south-dakota.html

This site is always a good source of information if you’re trying to puzzle out some likely spots missed by earlier prospectors. You’ll need to understand schists, quartz veins, dikes, sills, pegmatites, and ancient metamorphic rocks if you want to sort out the Black Hills geology. Roadside Geology of South Dakota is often sold with the Geological Highway Map for the Northern Great Plains region.

SD Department of Energy and Natural Resources

http://denr.sd.gov/des/mm/forms.aspx

Get a small-scale mining permit at the DENR’s “one-stop shopping” site. Check out the FAQ if you have questions. A small miners permit – a state level permit issued by the DENR – is required for anyone who uses motorized equipment, such as a dredge or high banker or panning wheel. It appears that if you want to use a bucket, shovel, and sluice, you also need to check in, but it’s always good practice anyway. At the very least, contact the National Forest if you are planning to do anything other than pan and trowel work. But it’s a good idea to just get the permit and start accumulating concentrates by the bucket.

Broken Boot Gold Mine

http://www.brokenbootgoldmine.com

The Broken Boot Mine is noted for its underground tours. It wasn’t the greatest gold mine, but makes for a dark underground experience. Here’s a snip from their home page: “…gold wasn’t the only metal Seim and Nelson found in their mine. They also found plenty of iron pyrite, or fool’s gold. Fortunately for the miners, iron pyrite was in demand. Since it could be used to make sulfuric acid, which was used in the processing of real gold, the miners could get decent money for iron pyrite. Indeed, the mine made more profit from selling fool’s gold than they did real gold.”

South Dakota history

http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/us/A0861208.html

If you just want a snapshot of the history of the Black Hills, Infoplease is a good site. Here’s a snip:

“Rumors of gold in the Black Hills, confirmed by a military expedition led by George A. Custer in 1874, excited national interest, and wealth seekers began to pour into the area. However, much of the Black Hills region had been granted (1868) to the Sioux by treaty, and when they refused to sell either mining rights or the reservation itself, warfare again broke out. The defeat (1876) of Custer and his men by Sitting Bull, Crazy Horse, and Gall in the battle of the Little Bighorn (in what is now Montana) did not prevent the whites from gradually acquiring more and more Native American land, including the gold-lined Black Hills.”

If you want to spend hours tracking down obscure historical facts, there’s no better site than the South Dakota State Historical Society. The link is http://www.sdhistory.org.

Ghosttowns.com is still one of my favorites. Try http://www.ghosttowns.com and click on South Dakota. Then you’ll get a list of old towns, such as Rochford or Rockerville. Be sure to think of them if you return from the area with photos, as they can use all the updated information and photographs they can get.

South Dakota GPAA

http://www.blackhillsprospectingclub.com

The site isn’t real active, but it’s a good start. I always get the best information when I talk to a GPAA member directly. The phone number is listed as (605) 341-0483 but is subject to change. Check in the Pick and Shovel Newsletter (free with membership) for the most updated info on state claims committees.

Geocommunicator

http://www.geocommunicator.gov

Since that’s where three of the four GPAA claims in South Dakota are located, I used the BLM’s Geocommunicator site to check the Rapid Creek area in Pennington County for active and abandoned claims. Here’s a snapshot of the area from the BLM’s LR2000 database:

Figure 4. Active claims on Rapid Creek as shown by the Geocommunicator tool.

Note that if I were to flip the switch on this display to show the expired claims, most of the streams and creeks in this area were under claim at one time, but there are a few open spots now.

Treasurefish

With all that gold mineralization in the Black Hills, you know there is bound to be some rockhounding as well. I checked Treasurefish and got this report about South Dakota:

“Don’t forget the gems - The State's best known chalcedony is its colorful and beautiful Fairburn agates. Named after a community near a very prolific agate deposit in Custer County, these brightly colored banded agates are similar to Lake Superior agates found in Michigan and Dryhead agates from Montana. The color patterns are alternating bands with one of the bands always white. The colors that alternate with white include yellowish-brown, dark red, salmon pink, black, yellow, grayish-blue, and milky-pink.

“The agate nodules range in size from about 20 millimeters in diameter to some that weigh as much as 20 kilograms. The nodules are recovered from the weathering of the Chadron Formation in an elongated belt covering parts of Custer, Pennington, and Shannon Counties, with the community of Fairburn at about the center of the belt. Nodules similar to the Fairburn nodules weather out of a limestone formation in an area that includes parts of Custer and Fall River Counties.

Other varieties of agate are found in the State. Moss agate, much like the famous Montana moss agate, can be found in river gravels of the Little Missouri River system in Harding County. A wide variety of agate can be found in the gravel pits in the entire eastern part of the State.”

The reliable Western Gem Hunter’s Atlas (Cy Johnson & Son, 1994) has good information about South Dakota. Here’s a snip of their map for the area around Deadwood and Custer.

Figure 5. Rockhounding map of western South Dakota, from Johnson (1994).

Summary

This should be enough to get anyone started on a fantastic trip to South Dakota. You can see why the reader got the idea in the first place – the place drips with history, the gold should be good, and there are a lot of things to see in the nearby area. I can even suggest a snip from a Beatles song to hum to yourself as you tour the area:

Now somewhere in the black mountain hills of Dakota
There lived a young boy named Rocky Raccoon…

Garret Romaine writes from Portland, Oregon.

Stevens Pass, Washington

As gold rushes go, the area to the west of Stevens Pass, Washington was just a minor footnote in western history. Located about 50 miles east of Seattle, the old mining districts were often located in remote, steep terrain, where rain and snow made conditions miserable. Today, few traces exist, yet there are still colors in several of the creeks, including my favorite, Money Creek.

In this article, I’ll describe a prospecting trip in late September, 2009 that took me to several different locales. I can update you on some of the road conditions, and maybe give you a few ideas of your own. The major producer in this general area was the Monte Cristo district, mostly wrapped up in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness Area and off-limits. So we hit it briefly, then concentrated on the next drainage south, along the Skykomish River, including Beckler River, Foss River, Miller River, Money Creek, the Sultan River, and the North Fork of the Skykomish.

Background

First, let’s understand where the area fits into historic gold mining in Washington, by consulting “old reliable” – U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 610:

“Gold was first discovered in the state in 1853 in the Yakima River valley by a party under the command of Capt. George McClelland exploring for a possible railroad route (Huntting, 1955, p. 28). By 1855, prospectors were active in the Colville district, although the first discoveries were not made until 1883. In 1855, small placers were found along the Columbia and Pend Oreille Rivers. From the 1850s through the 1890s, placers were worked along streams in Okanogan, Whatcom, Chelan, and Kittitas Counties and along the major streams of the state – the Columbia and Snake Rivers. By 1900, however, most of the placer deposits were exhausted.” (Koschmann and Bergendahl, 1968, p. 260)

For Snohomish County, the authors have a little more detail of interest:

“In south-central Snohomish County gold was produced from several districts in the western part of the Cascade Range. These districts – Monte Cristo, Index, Silverton, Silver Creek and Sultan—are more or less contiguous and occupy an area about 10 miles wide and 20 miles long extending from about the center of the county south to the King County boundary…The Monte Cristo and Silverton districts produced most of the gold in the county. Patty (1921, p. 282) estimated that the combined early production of all metals, but mostly gold, from these districts was worth $7 million. From 1903 through 1956, production was 9,595 ounces of lode gold and 535 ounces of placer gold.

“Spurr (1901, p. 804-805) believed that ore deposition began in late Pliocene or early Pleistocene and continued to the Recent. The most important deposits are mineralized joints within or near tonalite masses. Ore minerals are galena, sphalerite, chalcopyrite, pyrite, and arsenopyrite. An upper zone, with is nearest the surface, contains galena, sphalerite, and chalcopyrite and is richer in gold and silver…” (p. 261)

So what does that mean? Basically, you’re looking for sulphides, including fool’s gold, or pyrite. Western Washington’s incessant rain will turn sulphides veins black by liberating sulphur, and sometimes you can even sniff out a pyrite-rich zone.

Here’s a rough map of the major gold areas we’re talking about, taken from the Gold Digger’s Atlas:

Figure 1. Gold districts near Stevens Pass, WA. Cick it to make it larger.

Monte Cristo

Area	Monte Cristo
GPS reading	48.01887, -121.44429
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning
Warning(s)	Active claim near road; Old mines on private land
Waterway	South Fork Sauk River
Nearest town	Darrington

Figure 2. Mountains near Monte Cristo.

The simplest way to reach Monte Cristo is to drive south from Darrington on the Mountain Loop Highway, which is actually a gravel road in its more remote stretches. There is plenty of camping in the area, with primitive spots throughout but also organized camps, especially out of Verlot. At Barlow Pass, you’ll usually spot many cars parked along the road near the trail head. Be sure to lock your valuables. You’ll need to hike about a half-mile, as there is an active claim along the S. Fk. Sauk River.

This GPS reading is right on the road; it’s the best early place to hike down to the water on the easy, level trail. There is a big jumble of mossy boulders; go a little further, and you should locate a trail to the river that is short and doesn’t take you through the underbrush. Gravels are extensive here. Look for traps up and down the river. Rockhounding material includes gneiss, schist, quartz, granite, marble, etc. We chose a spot at the head of a big gravel bar and found good black sand in the first pan, and color in the second pan. The quantity of the black sand and the size of the colors increased with depth. Fill in your big holes.

There are mines everywhere in the hills above the ghost town, but most are private. It’s a gorgeous area, great for a day hike to the town site of Monte Cristo, now barely recognizable. Rockhounds talk about decent quartz crystals at high elevation above Monte Cristo. We took a detour up to a famed garnet collecting area on Sloan Creek, out of Bedal, but the road was washed out and we ended up collecting small garnets until we lost the battle with horse flies near the Sloan Creek trail head.

Traffic gets heavy along this scenic highway during the summer, and many tight passing spots along the loop are dangerous. Not all drivers are as courteous as you’d like them to be. Heavy rains have washed out this road in the past, and there is no way to predict if the road will always be open; be sure to email or phone the Snoqualmie-Baker National Forest at Darrington any time you plan a trip up here.

Beckler River

GPS reading	47.73496, -121.33371
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning for small garnets
Warning(s)	None
Waterway	Beckler River
Nearest town	Skykomish

The rest of the locales in this article are south of Monte Cristo, in the Skykomish drainage. We camped in the Beckler River campground, a very nice spot with no road noise from US Highway 2. An outcrop of garnet schist up river from the camp provides lots of garnets in the river gravels, and a little black sand, but we didn’t pull any colors from this locale.

A few years ago, the road looped from Skykomish, up Beckler River, then down to the Index area and back to Highway 2. In 2009, we ran into a sign that indicated the road was open only to local traffic when we were closing in on the old Galena area mines. This means that there is no public access to the Silver Creek district, which is a shame. On the other side of the loop, just outside of Index, the main road to Galena and Silver Creek is badly washed out, also preventing access. It’s a pity, because there is probably a good opportunity to pan from Silver Creek, and anyone interested in a challenging alpine hike can actually reach Monte Cristo by hiking up Silver Creek and across Poodle Dog Pass. Hopefully the road situation will improve in the future if there are enough forests to log up there.

Foss River

GPS reading	47.63053, -121.30924
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Limited panning
Warning(s)	None
Waterway	Foss River
Nearest town	Skykomish

Figure 3. Foss River flood zone.

About two miles east of Skykomish (which has gas and a liquor store) the Foss River Road heads south into the steep mountains. We followed it (also known as NFD 68) for about 6.5 miles, until it dead-ended at the trailhead. There are two old mining claims along the Foss River that date from decades ago, located below Trout Lake. There were hard rock mines around Trout Lake, but the area is accessible only via hiking trail. We walked in a little less than a mile and found a likely spot on the river, but the panning wasn’t that great. We pulled a little black sand, but nothing to brag about, and not enough color to spur us to look harder or longer. Honestly, the area looked like it had witnessed a horrific flood, and most of the small sand was blown away. Before I completely cross it off the list I’d want to hike all the way to the old mines at Trout Lake, but it isn’t high on my list.

Miller River

GPS reading	47.71073, -121.39742
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning, sluicing
Warning(s)	None
Waterway	Miller River
Nearest town	Skykomish

Figure 4. Entrance to the Mohawk Mine, near the Miller River.

To reach a good panning spot on Miller River, head west from Skykomish along the Old Cascade Highway about 2.3 miles until you see a left turn, south, on Miller River Road. This is NFD 6410. You’ll join up with the Miller River after less than a mile, and you can start looking for river access. Alternatively, you can turn off of US Highway 2 at the Money Creek campground turnoff, and you’ll see the turn onto Miller River Road after a mile.

We found good gravel bars that contained a tan-brown jasper, and some of it was so swirly that it is called picture jasper. What interested us were the boulders covered with moss, which we sampled with excellent results. There are also several decent bedrock traps, where the black sand was excellent, and the colors got better with depth. Unfortunately, the boulder we were carving under shifted and nearly claimed a miner, so we retired for lunch and moved on. Nobody said it was going to be easy.

Later, we hooked up with Daryl Jacobson of the group Northwest Underground Explorations. They’ve written three books on Washington underground mines, and each is a fabulous resource. Daryl helped us find the trail up to the Mohawk Mine, which was a small prospect along the Miller River. His group had been out recently, and there was flagging along the dim trail, so we easily found the entrance. The miners were apparently chasing a vein of blackened sulphides, and we got a couple samples before leaving.

There is excellent primitive camping throughout the area along Miller River, and the developed Money Creek campground is good, but has a little too much road noise for my tastes.

Money Creek

GPS reading	47.70719, -121.44274
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning, sluicing, etc.
Warning(s)	none
Waterway	Money Creek
Nearest town	Skykomish

Figure 5. Mossy boulders along Money Creek.

This was the best spot of the bunch, which must be why it’s called Money Creek. To reach our spot, turn off US Highway 2 at Money Creek, go past the campground, over the railroad tracks, and about a mile from US 2, look for the sign for Miller River. As soon as you turn onto Miller River Road, look for Money Creek Road. This is NFD 6420. Take it for about 2.3 miles to reach our spot, but you can stop anywhere creek access looks likely.

We found more of the tan picture jasper in Money Creek, and petrified wood is reported from the gravels in this area. There is bedrock here, which makes for excellent gravity traps, and the moss mining and crevicing was fantastic. The black sand was abundant, and we got color with the first pan. Again, there is good primitive camping all along the creek, and the developed Money Creek campground is OK, just close to US 2.

If the road isn’t washed out, the Washington State Mineral Council used to mount an annual expedition to the Damon & Pythias Mine on NFD 6422. If you enjoy going underground, your best option is to hook up with WSMC because they get the right keys to the right gates and get to swing their picks in the mine itself. There is nothing like seeing a little pinpoint of daylight at the end of a long mine tunnel, if you’ve never experienced that sensation.

Sultan County Park

GPS reading	48.01887, -121.44429
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Light panning
Warning(s)	No dredging in the park
Waterway	Sultan River
Nearest town	Sultan

Because the water was low and there wasn’t much going on, we stopped at the county park right on the Sultan River, practically in “downtown” Sultan. Take Albion Street north into the park, and angle over to where the river forms a nice elbow. There is an impressive little gravel bar there, and for many folks, this is about as close as you’re ever going to get to the Sultan placers. Since it’s a park, we didn’t go crazy, but we dug a couple holes on the inside bend of the elbow and panned out a lot of black sand before the rain drove us off. This is one of those spots where you might draw a crowd, you’d have to fill in your holes completely, and you might even make a good show of picking up some litter.

The problem with the Sultan River is access. We wanted to hook up with the Washington Prospectors and have them show us around the Sultan basin, but we managed to choose one of the wettest weekends of the year, so those plans fell apart. Way back when I was in graduate school at the University of Washington my wife signed me up for a non-credit gold panning class as a birthday gift. The class met at Horseshoe Bend, on the Sultan River, below the canyon and the dam. It’s on private utility land, and was open back then, but for the last ten years Horseshoe Bend has been off-limits. The spot was listed in old GPAA Claims Guides in the mid-1990s, but again, it is no longer open.

In fact, the best spots on the Sultan are claimed up by the big Washington club, and they wince every time the local magazines and newspapers write a story about weekend panners and the high price of gold. The inevitable result is that too many folks come out, end up getting lost or confused, accidentally trespass or claim jump, and generally cause problems. So I didn’t even stray up the Sultan, and I don’t advise that you do, either, unless you join the club first.

Sultan Bridge

GPS reading	47.86002, -121.81380
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning
Warning(s)	Bit of a hike
Waterway	Skykomish River
Nearest town	Sultan

Figure 6. Short beach near Sultan bridge.

Barring access to the Sultan River itself, you can do some decent panning around the point where the Sultan dumps its load near the Sultan Bridge. You should be able to spot a fisherman’s access and parking area just across the Skykomish River from Sultan. At 5^th Street, cross the river on Ben Howard Road, but once you reach the other bank, look for the parking area. There are two trails from the lot – one goes more or less northeast, while the other goes northwest. We tried the northeast route first and reached a steep bank with a small beach, and what looked like the pilings to an old bridge. Just for grins, we scraped some moss into a plastic bag someone had littered, and when we got it back to camp, we washed the moss in a five-gallon bucket and poured a good sample into a pan. The pan held a nice showing of black sand and a fine line of tiny gold pinpoints.

If you go on the other trail, which is longer, you can access a gravel bar directly across the Skykomish from the mouth of the Sultan River. The bedrock isn’t accessible, so you’re limited to float gold trapped in the gravels, or more moss mining.

Skykomish River

GPS reading	47.84517, -121.92648
Land Status	US Forest Service
Activity	Panning, crevicing
Warning(s)	Fishing spot
Waterway	Skykomish River
Nearest town	Monroe

Figure 7. Bedrock along the south shore of the Skykomish River near Monroe.

Because so many mines dot the hills above the Skykomish River, and gold enters in from the Sultan River, Miller River, Foss River, North Fork of the Skykomish, and Money Creek, we gave the big river a chance outside of Monroe. To reach this spot, from Monroe drive south on Lewis Street, which is also WA 203, for a mile until you reach Ben Howard Road. Take Ben Howard for about 2.1 miles until you spot the fisherman’s access point.

This public access spot has a bedrock outcrop at the upper end, and it’s covered with moss. There are gravity traps in the crevices that replenish constantly. The gravel bar itself can be crowded with fishermen during the fall season, but when its less occupied, you can rockhound the gravels for lots of interesting material for the tumbler.

Summary

The Steven Pass area has a lot more mining history than you might think. We sampled from multiple spots in a fascinating three-day tour, then set up a few of our panning machines in camp to figure out which area was best. Hands down, Money Creek was the winner. We ended up with the best colors and the most black sand from Money Creek, but Miller River wasn’t bad. The Sultan is promising, and spots on the Skykomish, such as the Gold Bar area, or our bedrock discovery near Monroe, were decent enough.

The Washington State Department of Natural Resources wants you to have a “Gold and Fish Pamphlet” with you whenever you pan, but the good news is that they finally relented and you can pick it up off their website, rather than get it mailed to you. Without the pamphlet, you can get a ticket, so be sure to follow up with the links below.

Links

Department of Natural Resources

Info on collecting, plus the home of the infamous Washington minerals checklist.

http://wdfw.wa.gov/habitat/goldfish/

Geology Adventures

Bob Jackson leads Washington field trips for newcomers and experts alike, priced accordingly. If you liked Hansen Creek, try Spruce Ridge or Big Rock Candy Mine.

http://geologyadventures.com/

National Forest pages

Crucial for road and fire information; always good to check in before you visit. Links to all Washington and Oregon forest offices.

http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/r6nf.htm

Washington Geology Maps

Those pretty colored maps that show the bedrock geology. Interactive; describes formations.

http://wa_geology.home.comcast.net/

Washington Prospectors Mining Association

Energetic group with tons of gold knowledge. Plus, they own their own claims.

http://www.washingtonprospectors.org/

Washington State Mineral Council

The grand-daddy of all Washington rock clubs.

http://www.mineralcouncil.org/

Bibliography

Johnson, Robert Neil, Gold Diggers Atlas. Cy Johnson & Son, Susanville, California. 1971; 64 pgs.

Koschman, A.H. and Bergendahl, M. H., U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 610: Principal Gold-Producing Districts of the United States, 1968. 283 pgs.

Northwest Underground Explorations, Discovering Washington’s Historic Mines, Vol. 1: The West Central Cascade Mountains. Oso Publishing Co., Arlington, WA. 1997. 230 pgs.

**

Garret Romaine is the author of Gem Trails of Washington, Gem Trails of Oregon, and Rockhounding Idaho.

Ghost Towns of Wyoming - Bald Mountain

During my travels to gold prospecting locales across the west, I’m often struck by the cold hard fact that some towns seem born to die out. Promising mines turn stingy at depth, or prices collapse; then the towns dry up and blow away. Often, there’s not much left but a tailings pile and some concrete foundations around the mill.

Sometimes it seems like the vast interior of the country is emptying out, but it’s always been that way. Gold prospectors know the history of the west better than most, as we can almost recite the stories about towns rising and falling with each new rumor. The ghost towns we know about are usually way up in the mountains, at the end of a long, bumpy road, and revolve around a big mine. The trade-off is that the more remote the old ghost town, the more likely that there are still good colors in the creeks and interesting specimens on the tailings piles.

For example, I’ve been spending the winter months researching gold districts in Wyoming. I hope to write my next general rockhounding book on the state, and I’ve been learning a lot as I dig in. One ghost town that came up in my reading was “Bald Mountain City,” which I had a tough time tracking down.

Gold In Wyoming

First, let me give a little background. Wyoming is known for two major gold districts: the Atlantic City/South Pass region, more or less in the upper Sweetwater River drainage, and the Keystone/Douglas Creek area, a reliable producer south of Laramie. The GPAA Claims Guide shows member claims in both districts, and if all you had time for was a trip to haul in some Wyoming gold, those would definitely be your first ventures. With the recent rise in gold, many old claims have been renewed, so it’s comforting to know that your membership provides full, legal access to claims in the two main gold districts in Wyoming.

However, my research takes me in a different direction; I want to know about other mineralized areas where rockhounds can find interesting material. So I’m always looking for locales that might be off the beaten path in order to come up with 150-200 sites in the state to check out. It’s comforting to know that there are additional mineralized areas to explore among all the Wyoming granite.

Using a simple Google search such as “gold in Wyoming,” I located and downloaded W. Dan Hausel’s excellent write-up, named “Searching for Gold in Wyoming.” The booklet is available as an Adobe Acrobat .PDF file and listed as Information Pamphlet #9. In the back, on the gold districts map (see figure 1), I saw a reference to Bald Mountain, located in a northern section of the Big Horn Mountains, north of Greybull. That was where my search started.

Figure 1. Principal mineralized areas and mining districts in Wyoming, from GeoCommunicator. Click on it to make it bigger.

GhostTowns.Com

I checked in another of Hausel’s Wyoming books, and found a reference to Bald Mountain City. When I Googled that, I found a note on http://www.ghosttowns.com. Here’s the report:

“Discoveries of fine-grained gold north of Bald Mountain were made in 1890. ‘Gold Fever’ brought many prospectors to the area over the next 10 years. In 1892, the Fortunatas Mining and Milling Company purchased a group of claims on the head of the Little Big Horn River and Porcupine Creek. The excitement led to the establishment of Bald Mountain City, the most extensive attempt at a settlement in the Big Horn Mountains. The gold rush ended by 1900 because yields were not enough to pay for the effort of panning. No current residents. The city's remains lie just east of the Medicine Wheel National Historic Site in the Big Horn National Forest, just off Highway 14A.
No buildings remain standing, only log foundations, metal scrap, etc. Look for clumps of trees where buildings once stood. SUBMITTED BY: Kevin J. Tupps.”

You might notice that there aren’t any good directions in that write-up. I’ve spent hours in fruitless search trying to find a locale with about the same information. I met a rockhound the other day who searched for an abandoned mine for THREE DAYS and was still upset about the adventure. So I was hoping that Google Earth might show me where the actual city ruins lay.

Here’s a case where Google Earth isn’t that helpful; I typed in “Bald Mountain City, WY” in the Fly To box, and nothing came back. The problem is that Google Earth is completely up to date, and unless a place name stuck, and people still live there, you can’t use their data to search for a ghost town. So I tried a back-door trick with Google Maps, located at http://www.maps.google.com. If you turn on the “terrain” feature, instead of just maps, you sometimes get place names.

Again, no luck. Bald Mountain City just didn’t stick. Instead, I got referred to City Park Drive in Boulder, Colorado. So I worked the old-fashioned way, tracing out US 14 keystroke by keystroke, ranging north and south. I finally located Little Bald Mountain, and then Bald Mountain, right along the road. I figured Bald Mountain City must be on the flanks of Bald Mountain.

GeoCommunicator

So I turned next to my stealthy trick to access topographic maps online: GeoCommunicator. Browse to http://www.geocommunicator.gov and click the link for “Mining Claim Map.” Then you just click your way to happiness. The BLM has performed yet another overhaul of the interface, and you can now drag your way across maps much easier. I use the World Street Map for a base until I pinpoint an area, and then switch to the Topo Map as I zero in. Because I had a good idea of where to look, it didn’t take long to strike electronic pay dirt.

Ranging north from Bald Mountain, I got lucky. I found Porcupine Creek, and it looked like it was open for panning. The next thing I noticed was Gold Creek, slightly east. That was a good start, and then I saw Half Ounce Creek, just to the north. I kept clicking to get the best resolution, and the map finally changed into that familiar topographic map format. And there it was: Bald Mountain City (site). I saw several prospect symbols north of town, a lot of abandoned four-wheel drive (4WD) roads, and sadly, a 20-acre placer claim on Half Ounce Creek. The good news was that the claim didn’t extend all the way to the Little Big Horn River, and Gold Creek was completely open. I snipped a little of the map in Figure 2.

Figure 2. Topo Map from GeoCommunicator shows the location of Bald Mountain City. Note current claim, indicated by rectangular hatched area along Half Ounce Creek. Click on it to make it bigger.

So now, using Google Earth, I tried to pinpoint the “modern” location of Bald Mountain City. I found what I was looking for and clicked the “My Place” push-pin icon, then dragged it to where I wanted it, entered a name, etc. Once in place, I right-clicked on the icon and asked for directions from Lovell, Wyoming, which I figured was near enough. I just wanted to turn off US 14.

From Lovell, drive east on US-14 about 40 miles. Turn north onto Sheep Mountain Road, and drive about 0.6 miles. (Google Earth thinks there is a short-cut here, but I’ve learned over the years that you can’t count on most of them, and if there is a main road, trust it for your mileage reading.) Take a right onto Forest Service Road 125, go about 1.4 miles, then dip down to the right for a tenth of a mile. There should be debris here to mark the old town. The GPS coordinates I’m using (until I can get there and verify them) are: 44.8063502, -107.7892637.

The next step will have to be a personal visit, sampling Porcupine Creek, Gold Creek, Half Ounce Creek, and the Little Big Horn River itself. I’ve never been to the site of Custer’s Last Stand, but I know it was on the Little Big Horn River, so here’s an opportunity to pan for gold on the same body of water. If one of you gets out there before me, please report your find!

Other Wyoming Resources

Wyoming Historical Society

One piece of data that can really aid a search for an old ghost town is the use of historical maps. At the Wyoming Historical Society, I found a page with plenty of old maps: http://wyshs.org/node/35. For example, on an old map for the Fort Bridger area, way stations for the Pony Express jump off the page. The rest of the maps on that page also show forts, corrals, way stations, and other historical information that could come in handy.

Wyoming Tales and Trails

http://www.wyomingtalesandtrails.com

This is a great site for poking around, with 900 photos and well-indexed stories about locales all over the state of Wyoming. The music was a little jarring the first time it kicked in, but I got used to it as I just kept looking around. I unearthed some corroboration for the Ghost Towns.com information on the Meeteetse page:

“Charles L. Tewksbury… was the manager of the Wyoming Mining & Milling Co. Previously, he had been the superintendent of the Fortunatus Mining Company's short lived but expensive efforts at gold mining near Bald Mountain City west of Dayton, Wyoming. In 1895 startling information was revealed as to the discovery of a rich claim at Bald Mountain. Mining machinery was hauled up the steep slopes by ox team from Dayton. In all, Fortunatus poured in about a half million dollars into the effort, all for naught. In late 1896, mining engineer and professor of chemistry and geology at the University of Montana, Fred D. Smith, in the Engineering and Mining Journal exposed the claims as being exaggerated. Although some mining continued near Bald Mountain City as late as 1903 and a revival was tried in 1937, the gold was not commercially viable. Today, Bald Mountain City lies abandoned with nothing to show that it was the site of a gold rush.”

Thunder Mountain Tours

http://www.thundermountaintours.com/tours.htm

If you want to take the family on a guided tour of not only Bald Mountain City but the Hole in the Wall camp used by Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, check out the tours page.

Where to Find Gold

http://www.iowagold.com/WHERE_TO_FIND_GOLD_USA_PAGES/wyoming_gold.htm

This web page has extensive information about most of the gold locales in the western US. Here’s what they say about Bald Mountain City:

“In T54N R87W, the Mosaic Claim produced lode gold. West of Sheridan about 60 miles on U.S. 14 and 14 Alt., on top of the Big Horn Mountains, take the north trending dirt road to the Bald Mountain area in T56N R91W. This is the old site of Bald Mountain City. Sometimes this old city was called "Baldy". It is at an elevation of 9,000 feet on the headwaters of the Little Big Horn River. There were many old mines in the area. North from here toward Montana line, in the disintegrated granite you will find fine grained free milling gold. 1 mile west of Sheridan you will find the old log structures of the old Forunatus Mill. The area around the Mill contains intrusive dikes or chimneys that have minor amounts of gold in them.”

Scenic Driving Wyoming

Here’s an excerpt from the book, which I also found with my Google search:

“The granite rocks in this area contain small amounts of gold-bearing quartz. Prospectors discovered fine-grained gold near here in 1890. Word spread and people flocked to the area, drawn by dreams of wealth. In 1892, the Fortunatas Mining and Milling Company bought some claims north of the highway at the headwaters of the Little Bighorn River and Porcupine Creek. Bald Mountain City, the largest attempt at settlement in the Big Horn Mountains, was founded. The cold, high elevation made life difficult for the miners. Yields were poor for the amount of hard labor required. The boom soon ended because no strikes large enough to be worthwhile were made. After the mining petered out, the town was quickly abandoned and little remains today, other than place names such as Gold Creek and Half Ounce Creek. Bald Mountain Campground, about a half mile down the road from the interpretive pullout, has sites sheltered from the wind by a grove of evergreens. About a mile past the campground is the turnoff on the right for the Medicine Wheel, another worthy side trip…Archaeologists are uncertain about the origins of the Medicine Wheel. Studies indicate that it may have been built sometime between A.D. 1200 and 1700…”

GNIS

http://geonames.usgs.gov

While drifting around looking for more information about Bald Mountain City, I stumbled across the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). I wish I’d seen it earlier. I clicked on “Search Domestic Names” and brought up a query form. I entered the information for Bald Mountain City and up it came. Not only that, it listed two alternate names: Bald City, and City of Broken Dreams. Over on the right side of the page is box of Mapping Services, including Virtual Earth, MapQuest, Google Maps, TerraFly, and TerraServer DRG, a topographical map server. Best of all, you don’t have to re-key the GPS coordinates, because the system automatically links you. At least I was able to confirm the GPS coordinates I interpreted from earlier on.

Summary

In closing, consider the words of W. Dan Hausel, the expert on Wyoming’s mineral riches that I mentioned earlier. I excerpted some of his advice from Information Circular #9: “The search for productive gold deposits requires a good background in prospecting and economic geology as well as some luck. There are still many placer and lode deposits to be found, although the discovery of entirely new mining districts is rare. In all my years as an exploration geologist, I have only been able to find one new gold district. However, I have found many gold deposits within known districts. Some of the better areas to search for gold are historical mining districts... In my experience, it is rare that any ore deposit has been completely mined out. Many historical and modern mines still contain workable mineral deposits as well as nearby deposits that have been overlooked. Many well-known giant mining companies of the past were notorious for overlooking significant ore deposits. Thus, one could potentially make a living just following up on the exploration projects of many of these past giants [as well as some projects of present giants].”

Garret Romaine is the author of Gem Trails of Washington, Gem Trails of Oregon, and Rockhounding Idaho,