Merced County, Calif GOLD mines, RARE old 1st ed, BIG sep. map, RAIN = NU GOLD

Description

Rare 1952 1st ed. report maps gold
mines in Merced County, Calif.
Also details Starbright Tungsten Mine, near
Barstow, Calif.: location, photos, history!
Has BIG separate map in rear-cover pocket
Tiny detail from BIG separate map in rear-cover pocket shows Merced County gold mines. Numbers are keyed to names and details on map and in text of report.
T
his 63-year-old rare first-edition report maps and describes two BIG gold producers in Merced County, California.
Map detail shows location of Starbright Mine in Mojave Desert, near Barstow.
It also maps and describes everything you need to know about the Starbright mine, which was "attracting widespread interest ... in San Bernardino County, California."
All Merced-County Sierra
streams have gold!
But first, back to Merced County: You may not think of it as a world-famous gold source like Mariposa County or the Mother Lode, but: "The beds of practically all the streams entering eastern Merced County from the Sierra County contain ... gold."
Just goes to show you that just about every inch of California has some pay dirt. And these Merced deposits are not penny ante: MILLION BUCKS in 1938 alone and above the million mark from 1935-1941 (amounts adjusted to today's gold values)! In fact, the Merced deposits were going gangbusters until the strategic minerals war act shut down all U.S. gold mines for the duration of the war. And as you can see, these pre-war production figures were HEFTY, and nothing to shake a gold pan at.
Gold mines dormant for decades?
Have these deposits sat dormant for decades, just waiting for someone to come along and reopen them? Got me. That research is up to you; we can't do everything for you. We'll tell you this though: Doesn't take much gold to make a mine pay these days, unlike pre-WW2 when gold prices were in the pits at 30 bucks or so.
Even if these sources have been tapped, so what? As the report says, "practically all the streams" in Merced County from the Sierra contain gold. You just need to find the right one, maybe with a nice solid-gold packed prehistoric-riverbed, just below the surface of one of Merced's modern-day rivers.
Wistful dreaming? I think not. Miners and prospectors who make today's HUGE strike-it-rich discoveries didn't do it by sitting around on their butts thinking about why NOT to do it. You can't do anything by sitting around on your butt. You gotta get out there; dig around in the dirt, and try.
Metal-detecting paradise; tungsten
ore bursts into color with UV light!
Not interested in prospecting for gold? Not a problem. These old mining reports have something for everyone. They list ALL the mine sites, everything from gold to copper to antimony to cement. If you're doing some metal detecting, it doesn't make any difference what kind of mine it was (unless you're nugget shooting). There's lenty of loot and artifacts at these non-gold sites, just waiting for your metal detector.
Maybe you're rockhounding? Then you know NOTHING lights up like tungsten ore ... And since the Starbright mine is a tungsten mine .... Well, you get the idea. Put down your gold pan and detector, and grab the UV light, and wait until dark. OR, hey, what am I saying? It's ALWAYS dark underground. How convenient is that? You can look for brightly colored tungsten ore in the day!
Starbright Mine, near Barstow, California. Pictures like this are ideal for positively identifying mine locations. Just match up details in the photo with the real landscape and you're done!
First edition in nice shape
This is not a reprint, but a first edition, in REALLY nice shape. It looks practically brand new except for some fading on the spine, o
ne of the best copies that I have seen of this rare title. So buy it now or forever hold your peace. Once it's gone, it's gone.
About five of 41 pages in the Merced County mineral-resources report are about gold (plus the two locations on the included BIG separate map in the rear pocket). There are also gold mines mentioned in the report's six-page chart of mineral deposits. As many gold deposits as the Mariposa County report? No of course not. But remember this: It only takes ONE rich deposit to end up with a truckload of gold nuggets!
Gold in sand and gravel!
We recently had a customer hit it big time at an abandoned sand-and-gravel plant. Say what? Read on.
For years and years, this operation had been classifying different size mixes of sand and gravel, never realizing that they were also separating out the much-heavier gold. Long story, short: Plant closes down in the early '50s, leaving house-sized waste piles behind ... or what they thought were waste piles.
Turns out that they had concentrated the gold for YEARS, leaving it all in a nicely separated +BIG+ pile. Our guy comes along and does a few test pans. His eyes practically bug out of his head when he sees the gold concentration in his pan. And the rest, as they say, is history!
It only takes ONE break to make it big.
Photo from book shows geology details in Merced County.
Treasure trove of information
How can you look for "color" in Merced County mine dumps or streams if you don't know where the best dumps or streams are? Why waste weekends randomly digging through tailing piles for specimens? This report will lead you to the most likely areas to hit pay dirt!
What about that Starbright Mine?
Glad you asked. ;-) It's about 20 miles outside of Barstow in the Mojave Desert (see map at top of ad). This mine was a hot one at the time of this report because the demand for tungsten was up, way up. And so were tungsten prices. By July 1951, the Starbright had yielded 10,000 tons of high-grade ore with no end in sight.
Some tungsten ores fluoresce brilliantly
Some tungsten ores are highly prized by rockhounds because they fluoresce brilliantly under ultraviolet light. Is this area open for collecting? You'll have to check (we can't do everything for you.) However, nonmechanized mining and prospecting on BLM land is usually totally legal.
We have many MANY more rare mining books! Just visit our ebay store, Rare Mining Books:
http://stores.ebay.com/Rare-Mining-Books?_rdc=1
This report isn't just for gold prospectors! It's also a treasure trove of information for history buffs, bottle collectors, photographers, geologists, hikers, offroaders, rockhounds, metal detectorists — just about anyone interested in learning about, exploring or prospecting old mine sites in historic Merced and San Bernardino counties.
This is not some gift-shop rockhound book; it was prepared by the California Division of Mines — written about miners for miners by miners.
When I say that this report is rare, I don't use that term lightly. I have seen a handful of these in 22 years of looking for California mining items. No collection of Merced County or California mining memorabilia is complete without this hard-to-find report.
Where is it?
Merced County — in "mid" California — is bounded on the west by Santa Clara and San Benito counties; on the north by Stanislaus and Tuolumne. On the east, we have Mariposa and Madera Adjacent to the south is ye olde Fresno County.
The Book:
The Merced County gold and tungsten mines article is part of a larger book,
California
Journal of Mines and Geology,
(cover, below right), 1952, State of California, Dept. of Natural Resources, Division of Mines, San Francisco, size: six by nine inches, stiff paper covers, about 62 pages total, about 44 pages in the Merced article: "Mines and Mineral Resources of Merced County, California," by George C. Hazenbush
.
About five pages of this are about gold, including several about legal aspects of dredging. Gold is also discussed in the tabulated list of mines.
"Geology of the Starbright Tungsten Mine, San Bernardino, California" is about four pages.
Overall in VERY nice shape. Binding is tight. Slightly bumped corners. Spine is sunned. Otherwise everything is near fine. All in all, one of the best copies that I have seen of this rare report. Pages are supple and not at all brittle. Maps are original and not copies.
As always, I am
extremely
conservative about rating book condition and very detailed in listing any potential flaw, no matter how slight. You get what you pay for. If you want a trashed book, filled with ripped pages, that the seller just "somehow forgot" to tell you about in his ad, then look elsewhere on ebay.
Payment methods and domestic shipping
Paypal only. FREE shipping. WOW!!! Hoo hah! I pride myself on bulletproof packaging and ship in sturdy cardboard boxes or reinforced padded envelopes.
The fine print:
Feel free to e-mail me if you have any questions about the item or terms of sale.
I post feedback once a week. Not responsible for typographical errors.
Good luck and thanks for looking!
Dragline shovel in Merced County.
Nearby counties
Nearby counties include: Inyo, Tulare, Fresno, San Benito, San Bernardino, Santa Clara, Alameda, San Joaquin, Calaveras, Amador, Alpine, El Dorado, Sacramento, Yolo and Napa.
Towns, population areas and interesting sites in or near Merced County include:
Amsterdam, Delhi, Irwin, Santa Nella Village, Arena, Dos Palos, Kadota, Santa Rita Park, Athlone, El Nido, Le Grand, Snelling, Atwater, Fergus, Lingard, South Dos Palos, Ballico, Fluhr, Livingston, Stevinson, Bear Creek, Gustine, Los Banos, The Grove, Hamburg Farms, Merced City, Trent, Buhach, Hilmar, Merced Falls, Tuttle, Castle Gardens, Hopeton, Plainsburg, Volta, Cortez, Ingomar, Planada and beautiful Winton.
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