Book Notes

(from the California HISTORIAN)

A Good Camp: Gold Mines of Julian and the Cuyamacas
By Leland Fetzer
Sunbelt Publications, San Diego, CA, 2002, 104 pages, paperback, $12.95, ISBN 0-932653-48-0

Reviewed by Ron Limbaugh
University of the Pacific History Department, Retired

This little case study of a small gold mining district in the peninsular ranges east of San Diego began as part of a larger social history of the Cuyamaca Mountains. Written by a retired San Diego State University Russian language professor in a lively, fast-paced narrative style, the book provides a brief but comprehensive overview of the region’s 30-year mining era.

The Julian district was a modest producer as far as California state gold figures go but a significant attraction to the Southwest coast in the latter decades of the 19th century. Beginning in 1870 with a placer gold discovery by a former slave, for six years the diggings boomed, then declined. In the late 1870s a second productive period began and lasted about 20 years. By 1902 the Julian-Banner district mines had nearly ceased production and there was not much mining activity after that. Although over a hundred claims were recorded in the region, 90 percent of the gold produced came from only eight mines, and 40 percent of that came from just one producer, the Stonewall Jackson, now in a state park located just outside the Julian district.

Based on extensive research using manuscript sources as well as technical literature and published reminiscences, the author makes good use of language skills in converting geologic jargon to readable popular English. He needed a consultant to help explain some mining terms and technology, however. A shaft is not the same as a stope (p. 20). Independent miners contracting to drive or cut (not “dig”) a horizontal bore (“tunnel” is commonly but inaccurately used) are not “miner-entrepreneurs” but tributers, or simply contractors (p. 55). Flotation does not “float off unwanted material,” but just the reverse: valuable minerals float to the surface, leaving the “unwanted material” behind (p. 88). Placer and quartz terminology are mixed in a confusing discussion about why the term “nugget” is rarely found in the Julian district, which had very little placer gold and very little water to power mining or milling machinery. Not very enlightening is the conclusion that a proposed mill did not operate either “because of technical problems or an inadequate ore supply” (p. 26), a statement that might apply to any defunct mining operation.

The author chose to leave all gold production figures in 19th century dollars, presumably calculated at $20.67 per ounce, the official gold price up to 1933. For gold bullion brought to the mint the price was somewhat lower, depending on impurities. Because of mint price variations and changes in the official price after 1933, readers of gold mining books are better served by converting prices to ounces. This would reduce the chance of misleading readers. Also misleading is the lack of distinction between production and profit. A property that produces bullion may or may not be successful, depending on net proceeds after costs are subtracted. Despite all the talk about mine owners’ “riches,” “fortunes” and “wealth,” it is not clear from this narrative whether any of the producing mines in the Julian-Banner district — aside from a lucrative 3-year run at the Stonewall in the late 1880s — was profitable.

While the narrative is brief and enlightening, the book could profit from a broader perspective. Since mines and methods are shaped by local conditions, it is difficult to describe mining operations in any generic sense. The Julian district had atypical conditions, but readers need to know how it differed from other districts. What were its unique features, if any? What special problems did miners face and how did they cope? The author suggests that gold mining in the Cuyamacas may revive if new technology is used to work “deeper and more complex ores” (p. 88) but offers no evidence indicating the presence of any such deeper ores, or does he explore fundamental economic, geologic, environmental, political and technical questions that complicate modern mining decisions. Regardless of how much ore may be underground, mining will not revive in the Cuyamacas — or anywhere else — unless all the conditions to satisfy both profitability and public policy are met.