Straub Stamp Mill at the Goldshot Mine

These pictures are a courtesy thru the eye and camara of "The Wider Betty Spooner", Your a "LUCKY DOG" George.
     
 

Back about a year ago while visiting the archaeological site in Holcomb Valley, I met Bill Sapp who is a  Forest Archaeologist for the US Dept. of Agriculture.  We got to talking about my involvement with the Clampers and that our chapter was named after Billy Holcomb.  That conversation led to discussing various mining areas throughout our region.
 
I received an unexpected call from Bill during the winter where he invited me and whomever might be interested in making recommendations on what to do with the stamp mill and equipment at Goldshot Mine located in Garner Valley.  Of course I jumped on this and sent out an email to various Clampers letting them know this was up and coming.  Bill finally gave me the date of March 24th to meet with him and tour the site.
 
A small group of us met and drove to the site where we met Bill.  In order to access the site, you have to drive across private property and then go through a locked USFS gate, where you drive a few miles to the site.  It was awesome and one of the most pristine sites we've seen in the Holcomb chapter.    The site was established in circa 1910 and was active until approximately 1970.  Primarily gold was mined but we didn't discuss any other materials that may have been removed during this time. 
 
The area has one old cabin, a vertical and horizontal shaft with numerous mining equipment and structures including the portable stamp mill seen in the pictures above.  After walking the sight, we recommended that it be left as it is and made accessible to the public and that we could possibly plaque it in the future.  We didn't think moving the equipment to some museum would capture the essence of the area.  If however, they wanted to move the equipment, we recommended moving it to the Hamilton Museum in Anza, which is close by. 
 
Bill Sapp, his Director and the property owner of the adjacent land are scheduled to meet on April 12th and we are invited to attend.  Bill will let me know the meeting details at a later date.  If anyone is interested in joining us, space is limited so we'll have to go on a first call basis.
 
Satisfactory
Bob Gall
DA #5