What would a trip to northern California be without a stop in Modesto, the home of George Lucas and the inspiration for American Graffiti? Well, our trip was not to directly answer that question but rather to visit the organic farmer's market they have here each week in the summer.
I went out looking for some possible photos along hwy 4 just west of Angels Camp, between here and Copperopolis. Here is what I was able to come up with. Parking old vehicles in fields is a thing here. I don't know why this is done exactly, but it is a common practice. In some places, folks even seem to do this as a way of decorating the scene.
Grass Valley is a much larger town than Nevada City. We stopped here for breakfast before heading back to Angels Camp. Mill street has been converted to a pedestrian street and is filled with nice shops and restaurants. We had a great breakfast here.
And so it goes.
Twenty years ago, I had just moved from South Carolina to Virginia and begun my career at James Madison University. Although it happened later for Elizabeth since she was staying behind to sell our house, my move north fell between a month long trip to South Africa and 9/11. A time of extremes...just like now.
Pine Grove is one of the better cemeteries we've visited in a while. There are many interesting people and their markers here.
I know it looks like all we do when visiting Nevada City is visit cemeteries. perhaps you are correct. But this is one of the places to learn about the people who built this corner of the world.
As we saw yesterday, there are plenty of wooden grave markers here. Some, like the one above, are clearly made by a hand not practiced in wood carving.
About 30 minutes out of Nevada City, as the crow flies, is the Malakoff Diggins State Park. This is the location of what was the largest hydraulic gold mine in California. Like many other mines, it were shut down due to the immense amount of toxic waste it produced.
The transition from the 1850's to the 1950's involved moving from man power to mechanical power. This included electric motors, steam engines, and Pelton wheels. On-site displays of some of the equipment reveals the technology of this gritty world. This device below has wooden brakes.
This Pelton wheel illustrated the importance of water in working this mine. Not only did they need water to help in the chemical separation of gold from the rest of the ore material, they also used water to drive these wheels to, in turn, run the stamp mills.
Ore was moved out of the mines and about the property in cars such as these.
Some of the remaining buildings are maintained here.
Inside this one is a machine shop for building and maintaining the operation. This was a self-contained operation. Amazing, dirty, loud, and very polluting. This is a big part of what put California on the map as the Golden State. But by the time this place closed down, that title was well supported by Hollywood.
One of our reasons for this particular venture in northern California is to see the Empire Mine. According to the California State Parks website, this is the site of one of the oldest, deepest, and richest gold mines in California. In operation for more than 100 years, the mine extracted 5.8 million ounces of gold before it closed in 1956. The park contains many of the mine’s buildings, the owner’s home and restored gardens, as well as the entrance to 367 miles of abandoned and flooded mine shafts.
Above is a gas pump that remains from the era of operation in the last century. I always find it a little unexpected to see a "modern" thing in what my brains associates with and "old" time. The trucks and gas pumps in Bodie were also like this. But, as you will see, there are many of these kinds of "cross over" items to be seen.
This young man seems to have lost his head at some point in the past but a good Samaritan re-attached it. Nevertheless, he is dressed in what seems to me to be clothing of another era even older than the provenance of this cemetery.
Naturally, we have to explore all the cemeteries. So we headed off to Grass Valley to see another Catholic cemetery. This one is also of god rush vintage but is still in use.
Not far from our B&B in Nevada City is a small, but interesting Catholic Cemetery filled with local history.
About 3.5 hours north of us (but still 3 hours or more south of the Dixie fire) is the small town of Nevada City. We decided to visit to see this place and the surrounding area. More on that in upcoming blog entries.
