$80.00 CAD
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Some of the handwriting (names especially) is hard to decode.
Condition is rough, with fold, stains and bits of paper missing...as perhaps expected from that time and environment.
11.5 x 19.5 cm
Location: The Alpha and Omega mines are the two primary hydraulic placer mines (Au-Ag-Pt) that comprise the Washington mining district in east-central Nevada County. They are located in secs. 16, 17 & 18, T17N, R11E, MDM, approximately 18 miles NE of Nevada City, in a National Forest area. The Alpha "Diggings" produced over $2 million (period values). Discovered after 1850.
History: While mining in the Washington District began in 1848-1849 as miners recovered considerable gold from placers of the Middle Yuba River, hydraulic mining of the Alpha and Omega deposits commenced in the mid-1850s. The mines were worked extensively until the mid-1880s when the Sawyer Decision put an end to large-scale hydraulic mining in the Sierra Nevada. Prior to that time, the Omega Mine was hydraulicked using three monitors. Water was obtained from a 9-mile flume and company ditches, which provided 5,000 miner's inches from the South Fork of the Yuba River, and another ditch, which brought 1,200 miner's inches from Diamond Creek. Tailings were channeled through a 3,000-foot bedrock tunnel and discharged into Scotchman Creek, which drained into the South Fork of the Yuba River.
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