May 16, 2009 7:17 pm US/Mountain
Central City Celebrates Gold Rush's 150th Anniv.
CENTRAL CITY, Colo. (CBS4) ―
On May 6, 1959 miner John Gregory panned a small creek in Gilpin County in search of gold. He found a high concentration of gold flakes and began looking for the source in the surrounding hills.
Modern day miner Stefan Degraffenreid frequents what quickly became known as the Gregory Diggings.
"They went up on the hill and they grabbed some dirt out of the old quartz on top and brought it down and panned it out," explained Degraffenreid.
Gregory discovered a huge, rich vein of gold.
"I wish I had found it," Degraffenreid laughed.
The discovery put Colorado on the map for good.
"This was the one that really justified the Colorado Gold Rush," said historian Tom Noel. "Nobody was making any money until we found the Gregory Lode right here."
Noel recently joined the Gregory Day festivities at the monument that commemorates the man whose discovery lead to Central City becoming the largest city in Colorado in the 1860s.
The town celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Gregory Diggings with a Whisker Tournament in honor of John Gregory.
Some of the categories included new beards, old growth and un-groomed.
"Now my wife can be a lady. Now my children can get educated." Those were the words that John Gregory spoke after he found the Mother Lode, the great rich Gregory Lode in Central City and Blackhawk.
"A lot of discoveries were hoaxes and humbugs," said Noel. "There was no real find, but with this one Colorado struck it rich all thanks to this John Gregory, a poor illiterate southerner, a Georgian who had worked the gold fields there in the 1830s and he knew how to find gold."
(© MMIX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
Click to enlarge
Click to enlarge
Stumble It!
Reporting
Comments