California Gold Rush Research Paper

A mining community, also known as a mining town or a mining camp, is a community that houses miners. Mining communities are usually created around a mine or a quarry. Many of the Americans dreamed of striking it rich. In 1849 the California Gold rush made that possible for a lot of the dreamers. A lot of people gave up after several years of trying to find nuggets of gold because it wasn’t as glamorous as they thought or hoped it would be. Mining was miserable you get up really early and leave really late at night. The conditions were nasty, there were rats everywhere and it was very dangerous. The miners were mainly scared of the mine caving in but also scared of the gas exploding. They were also really lonely and homesick. To really understand

It was rather exhausting and you would have to squat for long periods of time. There were many boom towns throughout the Western United States. They didn’t only look for gold and silver. Some of the things they mined other than gold and silver were zinc, copper and lead. Soon many people would come looking for a chance to get rich fast. The people that didn’t strike it rich went to work in the mines for the Eastern financiers. Potato Creek Johnny a lucky guy that did strike it rich. He then became famous for one of the largest nuggets on record. He found it in Deadwood, South Dakota. The nugget weighed 7 ¾ troy ounces, it was worth $250 in that time. At the time this wasn’t Americans land to come settle and look for gold. It was the Sioux land, the land they were promised until the government kicked them out. The government discovered gold so he kicked them so they didn’t have it all to

With all the coal dust in the air, it made it so you were always breathing it in. In the long term it made it very dangerous for your health. Sometimes if there was just one little spark it could set off an explosion. It is a combination of coal, dust and gas. It creates a kind of tornado effect. The miners were all very well educated on this. Coal gives off a gas that is impossible to see. It is often called the white damp. A lot of mining companies cut corners to make more money and not go under. This was catastrophic to the mine and the miners. When cutting corners this caused a lot of explosions and people working in very dangerous situations and conditions. When an explosion happened most miners were trapped like helpless animals. They couldn’t do anything so they died of being burnt