Miners from Sonora, Mexico, gave this area the name veta madre (mother lode) because of the incredibly rich quartz veins they found. The name has stuck.
The Mother Lode is located on state highway 49, and much of this 266-mile stretch, which runs along the western slope of the Sierra from Mariposa to Sattley, has been restored to the quiet, rural look that California must have had before the gold rush. But in the ten years following the discovery of gold, the area was teeming with people. Wherever the yellow dust glistened in the earth, towns were built and then abandoned when the gold dried up. As long as they lived, the towns served only one purpose - to satisfy the needs of the miners.
Of the 546 mining towns described by historians, 297 have completely disappeared; some of the remaining ones are little more than fanciful names on a map.
Wherever the miners moved to build again, a retinue followed. Saloon keepers came first, often opening with nothing more elaborate than a plank spanning two barrels and hastily rigged canvas walls - or no walls at all. One bartender reported a profit of $7,000 on every barrel of whiskey sold. The ladies of the gold field came next, filling the dance halls, gambling dives and the inevitable bawdy houses, with the soft smell of perfume and cigar smoke. Then came the merchants, with stores to provide the necessities that were only a little less expensive than the luxuries. A slice of bread cost $1, and another $1 to butter it. A shovel cost $50.
Few complained, though, because at almost every stream the happy miners found gold. A man working with just a pan could wash from $10 to $50 of gold per day - during a lucky streak. One man found a three-ounce nugget while making a hole for a tent stake; another fount a half-pound nugget by rolling aside a rock he had been using for a seat; still another made a rich gold strike on moon-lit night while searching for hie lost cow near what was thought to be a mined-out area. Who could believe that there was an end when a 141-pound nugget was found in Sierra City, a 75-poung nugget in Woods Creek and a 214-pound nugget in Calaveras County near Carson Hill?
Life in the gold camps was hard. There was no medicine, and lodgings were primitive. It was often necessary to stand for hours in mud or icy streams. But the miners were conditioned to accept the rigors they found. It has been said that "the cowards never started, ant the weaklings died on the way" - a statement easily believed after a look at the routes to the gold fields.
An argonaut (gold-seeker) had three choices of travel: a 15,000 mile sailing trip around the Cape of Good Hope, being completely at the mercy of wind and tide; a "shortcut" across the Isthmus of Panama, where he faced malaria, mosquitos, oppressive heat and an endless wait for sailing ship to California; of a 3,000-mile trek across the plains, where thirst, cholera and unfriendly Indians awaited him.
Arriving in California, he found it in a state of turmoil; Mexico had thrown down the reins of government, and the U.S. had not yet picked them up. The nation's capitol was over 3,000 miles away and exerted little influence. Law was usually administered by an alcalde - a combination judge-mayor-sheriff who made up laws as he went. On occasion, when the guilty had no money, fines were levied against the accusor. If no law was present, the miners interrupted their work briefly to form their own law system - handing our "hasty-justice" at the end of a rope. Even thought this law was harsh it was usually just.
American miners felt they had more right to the gold than the immigrant miners who swarmed in from all over the world. The Americans banished the Mexicans from Quartzburg, chased the Chileans and French from Mok Hill, and drove the Chinese from the richer deposits. Using their prejudices as their justification, the Americans took claims for themselves, having little patience for the "foreign" miners.
By 1850, when California achieved statehood, gold-hungry men were streaming in from every continent, eager to share the riches. By the 1860s placer (surface) mining had become unprofitable, and most miners turned to the deep-shaft quartz mining methods, employed in the Placerville and Green Valley areas since the early 1850s. Seeking gold became a business instead of an adventure as expensive shafts were sunk, sometimes as deep as 9,''' feet. After 1860 giant water hoses were used to convert whole mountain sides into muddy streams, which were sluiced for gold. Entire valleys were gorged with mud, and San Francisco Bay became partly clogged until hydraulic mining was outlawed in 1884.
Then it was over. Some mines continued to operate, but high operating costs and the fixed price of gold closed them down for good in 1942.
