California Gold nuggets

Sometimes called THE FATHER LODE, extensive placer gold deposits were discovered in Trinity County back in the early 1800s.  Ancient drainages criss-cross the upper elevations all over the place. Epochal erosional forces deposited sediments on a monumental scale.   Rugged, ambitious men ferociously tore into these gold-bearing formations. Towns sprang up, the vestiges of a civil, polite society grew out of these gnarly roots of humanity. 1800s and early 1900s miners blasted down ancient river gravels from high elevations throughout a quadrant encompassing roughly 50 to 75 square miles. On an equally bold scale, bucketline dredges churned up though these canyonlands grabbing at the precious metal found mostly near bedrock. Squeezed in there were the uncountable minions of small-scale, independent miners.  They came in every cut and color. With picks, shovels, rockers, goldpans, long toms, water cannons, big sluices...I mean BIG sluices. They survived by the law of the west.  Try and imagine the struggle.  A few of them struck it rich. A lot of them made a livin', that's for sure. The outcome is never gonna be the same for any two people. I've hunted these old diggings and observed that many of these intrepid argonauts most surely eked out an existence. What a colorful era it musta been. Now we've got the next generation of adventurers. You might as well go try to find a little gold on your own.