Gold mines, Madera County, Calif, BIG separate maps, RARE old report, 1st, VG+

Description

Rare 1st-edition report pinpoints all mines
and deposits in 1950 Madera County, Calif.
Includes 21 gold mines, 17 tungsten mines and MORE!
Oversize detached maps locate
mines; text gives exact coordinates
Every one of those "G" symbols is a gold mine; the "T" symbols are tungsten. Small detail of separate map in rear pocket shows mines, mines and more mines! Map is in like-new beautiful shape.
T
his rare first-edition report locates 38 separate gold and tungsten mines in California's Madera County — near Grub Gulch, Bass Lake, Zebra, Birch and more!
If you think there isn't any gold in Madera Couny, you'd be wrong! Some of the older prospects in this county might be hiding some surprisingly good payouts. Remember you don't need to find a rich mine every day; you only need to find one once.
And Madera County doesn't just have gold, it is also a great place to look for a lost and forgotten rich gold deposit. Afterall, all the famous gold-rich counties — like Mariposa and Inyo — have been combed from stem to stern for decades, for every little speck of remaining gold. It only makes sense for the serious gold seeker to probe an area that might have been previously overlooked.
Perfect places for exploring, metal detecting, photography
And Madera doesn't have just gold mines; it has everything from tungsten to feldspar to copper, manganese and pumice, about 70 mining sites in all. Perfect places for exploring or metal detecting, photography or any one of 50 other reasons to visit old mining sites.
The Chowchilla Dredging Company goes at it with a 10-inch suction dredge on the Chowchilla River, about seven miles above Raymond.
Suction dredging advances made in Madera
At the time of this report, much of Madera gold mining was being done by SMALL suction dredges bringing in BIG amounts of gold "along the lower courses of the Fresno, Chowchilla and San Joaquin Rivers." Many of these machines were small enough to be easily operated by one man. In fact, in 1950, Madera was quietly becoming the hub for manufacture of the best suction dredges, large AND small.
"The largest suction dredge made in california for gold mining is now being assembled in Madera," says the report.
Impressive gold yields
And this report details all the advances and inventive dredge enhancements coming out of this county, including patented assemblies like digging nozzles. The yields coming from the Madera gold fields using these new techniques are impressive indeed. The report explains who is doing what to get the best yields: "Two of these dredges will be described in some detail."
Report includes an oversize map of the whole county showing all mineral deposits, including gold, silver, tungsten, copper, asbestos, feldspar, granite, iron, lead, zinc, magnesite, manganese, natural gas, nickel, cobalt, pumice, pumicite, and stone. Note quarter for scale.
How much gold were they pulling in?
"On the Polk Ranch, 9000 cubic yards of gravel dredged in 1942 yielded 148 ounces of gold and 32 ounces of silver ... G. E. Noble and Sons operated a suction dredge on the J. T. Picree Ranch in 1942, handling 7790 cubic yards of gravel which yielded 118 ounces of gold and 35 ounces of silver."
That's over 0,000 in gold (at today's prices) in one year on a very small-scale parttime operation. Now that's not shabby for a county not normally associated with gold mining. Are these prospects located in the report? You bet they are.
Here are just a couple of the report's prospects:
Mud Springs Mine
— Owners: Wm. P. Lasher, 4211 Ball Ave., Fresno; location is given in range and township coordinates.
Waterloo Mine (six claims)
— Owned by the Paymaster Mining Co.; location is given in range and township coordinates.
Texas Flat Consolidated Mine
— Wm. Kruhn of Coarsegold is the owner; location coordinates are given.
Every gold mine is listed
This 61-year-old report alphabetically lists
every known gold, silver, tungsten, copper and iron prospect
in Madera County — both famous and forgotten — in a table
. Some are detailed in the text.
This list gives exact locations of all mining sites, sometimes using landmarks, but almost always using
infallible range-and-township coordinates
. Road names or landmarks may have changed radically since 1956, but these coordinates have not. Just plug 'em into your GPS or look 'em up on the appropriate topo, and you're there!
Suction dredge, 6-inch, Fresno River, at crssing of Coarsegold-Raymond Road.
Also valuable to stock certificate collectors
Because this report lists mine names, it is also a valuable tool for collectors of stock certificates.
This is not some gift-shop rockhound book; it was written about miners for miners by miners. Prepared by the California Division of Mines, it's a treasure trove of information for history buffs, bottle collectors, photographers, geologists, hikers, offroaders, rockhounds, prospectors, metal detectorists — just about anyone interested in learning about, exploring or prospecting old mine sites in historic Mono County.
Invaluable info!
Okay, so you have a book by a "noted rockhound" or an "ace prospector." You might get lucky and find a couple of neat places, but you'll also hit plenty of absolute duds. Why? Because what rockhound, mine explorer or prospector in their right mind would give away their favorite productive locations? Not one.
Tungsten outside an Inyo County mine: Scheelite and other tungsten ores fluoresce brilliantly in UV light. Photo by Floris van Breugel
What they will give you are directions to sites that are picked clean or second rate at best. Don't rely on secondhand information when you can get firsthand info from this book. I
guarantee
that most — if not all — tourist-oriented rockhound and prospecting books for this quadrangle have used this 1950 book as a prime source for information.
Rare first-edition report
This is the first one of these reports that I have seen in 10 years, and I have been collecting and selling rare mining books for almost 20 years now. Don't wait to buy this, thinking another one will pop up on ebay for cheaper. Ain't gonna happen.
So buy it now or forever hold your peace. Once it's gone; it's gone.
Big bucks could lurk
in forgotten deposits
These deposits are exactly the type sought by modern-day prospectors. Miners back in the day already did all the really hard work. They discovered the deposits for you. In some cases, after they found the deposits, they walked away because the gold ratios weren't high enough.
But times have changed. Gold is now worth FIFTY TIMES the lousy an ounce it went for in the '50s. These deposits aren't just borderline economic today; they are rich deposits by today's gold and silver prices. What's more, this report says that some (if not most) of the gold is FREE placer gold, not tied up in sulfides or other hard-to-process chemical compounds. You can test for worth with a simple gold pan. You can even extract considerable quantities of gold with the same pan! Or even an old cake tin from your kitchen. It does not get any easier than this.
Tungsten ore glows brilliantly
"But I'm not a gold hunter," you say. "I want to [fill in the blank]."
Not a problem. This book isn't just for gold seekers! It is a treasure trove of information for history buffs, bottle collectors, photographers, rockhounds, hikers, offroaders, metal detector enthusiasts, prospectors, geologists — just about anyone interested in the Madera County's geology, scenery and historic old mining sites. Sick of metal detecting where every square inch has been dug 500 times? Then this book is definitely for you.
There are plenty of mines other than gold mines in this report. Quite a few are tungsten mines. Much tungsten ore is prized by collectors because it fluoresces beautifully under UV light (see photo). Tungsten ore from this area is no exception.
Other mines in this report include:
silver, tungsten, copper, asbestos, feldspar, granite, iron, lead, zinc, magnesite, manganese, natural gas, nickel, cobalt, pumice, pumicite, and stone.
The book:
"Mines and mineral deposits of Madera County, California," in
California Journal of Mines and Geology
, Vol. 46, No. 4, October 1950 (cover at right); 38 pages, including oversize foldout maps of the county's mines and mineral deposits. Published by State of California, Department of Natural Resources, San Francisco, six by nine inches.
Overall in very good to near-fine shape with some slight yellowing, bumped corners. Binding is tight. Former owners' stamps; "Madera" written on cover. Card pocket, ex-library. Both maps and text are in very good, near-fine shape. All in all, one of the best copies that I have seen of this rare report.
Payment methods
and domestic shipping
Paypal only. I pride myself on bulletproof packaging and ship in sturdy cardboard boxes or reinforced envelopes.
The fine print:
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions about the item or terms of sale. I post feedback once a week. Not responsible for typographical errors.
Good luck and thanks for looking!
Towns and nearby counties
Adjacent counties to Madera are:
Fresno County, southwest; Merced, northwest; Mariposa, north; Tuolumne, northeast; Mono County, northeast. Nearby counties are Inyo, San Bernardino, Kern, Tulare, Kings, San Benito, Merced, Stanislas, San Joaquin, Calaveras, Amador, El Dorado and Sacramento.
Towns, population areas and interesting sites in or near Madera County include
Devils Postpile National Monument; Inyo National Forest (part); Sierra National Forest (part); Yosemite National Park (part); Chowchilla, Madera, Ahwahnee, Bass Lake, Bonadelle Ranchos-Madera Ranchos, Coarsegold, Fairmead, La Vina, Madera Acres, Nipinnawasee, Oakhurst, Parksdale, Parkwood, Rolling Hills, Yosemite Lakes, Knowles, North Fork, O'Neals, Raymond, Ripperdan, Death Valley Acres, Olancha and of course Sugar Pine.
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