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Founded in 1848, Placerville has been
known by several names. Originally called Old Dry
Diggins, the name changed to Hangtown in 1849 after
citizens took law and order into their own hands and
hanged three men. It was incorporated as Placerville in
May 1854.
The entire region around Placerville was
rich in gold. Large quantities of gold were mined from
Hangtown Creek which runs right through the center of
Placerville. The town also served as an important supply
venue for towns and mining camps to the north and south.
Nearby is the Marshall Gold Discovery
State Historic Park in Coloma, where James Marshall
discovered gold in 1848.
James Marshall was 37 years old when he
found the first flakes of gold in the tailrace of a
sawmill he was building for John Sutter on the American
River, setting off the gold rush. The westward
migration, previously a trickle, turned into a flood of
emigrants heading west to claim their fortune. |
Emigrants headed west, driven by greed
and "manifest destiny" to expand the
nation's boundaries from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
In the process, they devastated native cultures that
had endured for thousands of years. At the same time,
a much neglected, 300-year-old pastoral Mexican
province suddenly became the new state of California. |
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Even before the discovery, California
was considered to be rich in minerals. Spanish
missionaries had found gold in several places prior to
the "official" discovery. But, on that fateful
day in 1848, Marshall was not really looking for gold.
The sawmill he and his crew were attempting to construct
was well on its way to completion -- except for the
tailrace, which was too shallow to carry water fast
enough past the wheel that powered the saw. Marshall
decided to dig the tailrace during the day and then let
water scour the bottom at night. This worked, but also
turned the ditch into a giant sluicebox with cracks in
the exposed bedrock serving as riffles to catch the gold
that washed from the loosened gravel of the banks. |
On that Monday morning, as Marshall walked
down the tailrace below the mill wheel, he saw the dull pieces
of metal glimmering in the a crevice in the smooth granite
bedrock under a few inches of water. Marshall could not be
sure that this was actually gold; iron pyrite and blotite, or
"fool's gold," are common in the Sierra Nevada.
But when Marshall hit the metal with a rock,
the flake bent, but did not shatter as fool's gold would have.
He picked up several small pieces, the largest "about
half the size of a pea," placed the yellow metal in the
crown of his battered hat and returned to the mill. "Hey,
boys," he is remembered as saying, "by God I believe
I've found a gold mine."
Ironically, Marshall would benefit
little from his discovery. Although he spent a number
of years prospecting for gold following his discovery,
he did so with little success. Towards the end of his
life, Marshall was reduced to selling his signature on
a card attesting to his status as "the discoverer
of gold in California" for 25¢. |
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But many others would benefit, including the
fledgling settlement of Mormons in Utah. Between 1848 and
1851, more than $80,000 went through Brigham Young's gold
accounts into the Mormon mint.
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