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E-Ticket
on the East Fork
Located in the Angles National Forest, the San Gabriel River winds its way north from the city of Azusa, California shadowed closely by Highway 39. About 10 miles from the mouth of the canyon is the steel and concrete bridge that is the gateway to the East Fork of the San Gabriel River. This is where my "E" ticket starts. You can pick your category of treasure hunting for the day and then just go to it. Are you looking for sites to metal detect, an area to prospect for gold, lost mines, or ghost towns? The East fork has it all along with the untamed and scenic beauty of the San Gabriel Mountains. First let me take you back to the 1850's, a time when gold in California was the lure to catch the attention of any man willing and able to seek his fortune. Although most men ended up in the gold fields in the north a few were lucky enough to make strikes right here in the San Gabriel's. In 1854 the first strike was noted in the Los Angeles Star and from that time on people streamed into the canyon to seek their fortunes. By May of 1859 the entire stretch of the East Fork was being prospected and it is said that 'color' could be detected in each and every pan. Over the last 130 years it is estimated that around $13 million in gold has been retrieved in one form or another out of the waters of the East Fork and the surrounding mountains that feed it. Placer mining is still very popular today with prospectors looking to add a bit of 'color' to their lives. Panning, sluicing, and dredging can be watched in action most times of the year except during high water. This prospector likes to sample the ancient river gravel in the benches nearly 75 to 100 feet above the river. I've had good luck quite often and know of others that recently pulled out at least 7 ounces from a spot know known as 'Nugget Gulch.' About two miles into the canyon on your right is the site of Camp Oak Grove. For you hunters of buried stagecoach loot, this spot is known for the Oak Grove Treasure. It was in the year 1853 that a quartet of bandits held up a stage around the present day town of Claremont. $30,000 was in the Wells Fargo chest that was thrown down from the stage. The four bandits headed up San Antonio Canyon with the loot and then west on the East Fork of the San Gabriel. As they were reaching the junction of the East Fork and the west fork of the river the men split up knowing a posse was hot on their trail. The leader of the gang stopped around the area we now call Camp Oak Grove and it was around there that he buried the saddlebags filled with loot. The other three bandits were killed near the Rincon Ranger Station. Eventually the leader was also overtaken and killed. The money was never recovered. A mile farther up the river is the site of the oldest standing building in the entire San Gabriel Mountains. It is called Roberts Store and it was built in the year 1861 by Henry Roberts to supply the seemingly endless stream of miners that were flowing into the canyon seeking the yellow metal. Roberts who ran the store and a stage line watched eagerly the men who withdrew the gold deposited in the banks and benches along the East Fork. Roberts invested in hydraulic mining equipment, which left the scars you see on the left side of the road right at Follows Camp. The hydraulic mine used water, gravity fed from ponds higher in the canyon, through pipes, and finally out of a monitor, that washed down the mountain side. The gravel and dirt then was run through the long sluice boxes to retrieve the gold. The mine had only moderate success until the 1874 injunction against polluting the waters brought the whole business to a halt. The old Roberts Store is now a mini museum located on the property of Follows Camp. The camp was founded in 1896 by Ralph Follows, an Englishman who had come to the area because of the therapeutic healing powers thought to be found in the canyon. Almost immediately Follows health improved and he set out to build a resort. The camp eventually held up to 200 guests in tents and cabins that were brought up from Azusa some 12 miles away by a stage line that Follows started himself to improve business. The place did a fine trade until the 1920s when the automobile and paved roads took away the remoteness of the camp to travelers. The Camp still exists today offering overnight camping, a restaurant, museum, and a mining supply store. The camp is often the site of Blue Grass Festivals and Gold Mining shows. Up most of the auxiliary canyons are small tunnels and workings of the early miners. Detectorists and prospectors are seen all times of the year searching for nuggets in these canyons and washes.
At the merging
of the East Fork and Cattle Canyon is the ghost town site of Eldoradoville.
The town sprang to life in 1859 complete with a boarding house,
butcher shop, barber, and three stores. Of course it also had
its share of saloons. Some say there were as many as six to wet
the whistle of the parched miners. A canyon resident named John
Robb said he made more money by running the sawdust from under
the saloons through his sluice box then he did from real mining.
It seems the miners when they drank were quite sloppy with their
poke.
If you follow
the fire road at the far end of the parking lot it will lead you
to an area called Heaton's Flats. Along the way you will also
notice workings on the left side of the road and on the right
is a 'coyote hole' just big enough to crawl through that opens
up to reveal a large but very unstable cavern tunneled out by
early Indian miners. I can testify to the fact that these 'coyote
holes' litter the mountainside everywhere there are ancient gravel
deposits to be found. The Indian miners would burrow into a deposit
that contained gold and follow the layer until it played out.
Some of these holes are just big enough to slide in and you can't
turn around or barely move in any direction but in or out. These
holes in the gravel banks are very dangerous and I recommend you
stay out. Besides being soft and unstable ground they are the
dwellings of choice for many wildlife creatures including the
rattlesnake.
Across the
river from the Flats is "Deadmans Hill" the location
of a grizzly discovery a number of years back. A Mexican miner
found the skeleton of a man wedged in a hole under a boulder on
this hill still clutching his poke, which had gold dust in it.
His arm was outreached as if he was offering his poke to whoever
would save him from his death. It is assumed a rattler bit him.
He was seen quite often at the stores buying supplies with gold
dust and many times he would stay at the saloons buying drinks
for all his new found friends. He never seemed to be lacking funds
to support himself or his good times. No one knows where his claim
was but he was seen many times crossing the river by Heatons Flats.
Keep in mind
also on your way up to the East Fork the massive Morris and San
Gabriel Dams and the camps that housed those workers in the 1930's.
Near the forks was also a place called Construction City that
housed over 600 workers in 1929 for a dam project that was never
completed. So, what more
could you ask for? How about a hidden cache buried by the Knights
of the Golden Circle? Maybe, in fact there was a chapter of 27
members of the Confederate supporters in Eldoradoville in the
early 1860's and it was rumored that money and weapons were buried
to be used in the event the War Between the States reached their
backyard.
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