“In the days of old, in the days of gold, in the days of ‘49”
California State Highway 49, the “Mother Lode Highway,” can truly take you back to the days of ’49. The road connects gold rush mining camps, ghost towns and historic sites from Oakhurst in the south, to Sierra City in the north. It’s three hundred miles of beautiful country along the foothills of the Sierra Mountains. Twisting mountain roads, sheer granite walls, precipitous drops to swiftly moving rivers. Old buildings, gold mines, forgotten cemeteries. Let’s go see what we can find.
This location was originally known as Ridleys Ferry, for Thomas E. Ridley who operated a ferry here from 1850 to 1852. Around 1860, the name was changed to Benton Mills, after Frémont’s father-in-law, Senator Benton of Missouri. A report published in 1859 stated that a sixteen stamp mill was crushing 130 tons of ore every day and a forty-eight stamp mill was under construction.
Read MoreJoshua Tree National Park, the California Gold Country, forgotten places in the Mojave Desert. These are a few of my favorite things.
