A gold rush or gold fever is a discovery of
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...
—sometimes accompanied by other
precious metals and
rare-earth minerals—that brings an onrush of miners seeking their fortune. Major gold rushes took place in the 19th century in Australia, New Zealand, Brazil, Chile, South Africa, the United States, and Canada while smaller gold rushes took place elsewhere.
In the 19th century, the wealth that resulted was distributed widely because of reduced
migration costs and low barriers to entry. While
gold mining itself proved unprofitable for most diggers and mine owners, some people made large fortunes, and
merchants and transportation facilities made large profits. The resulting increase in the world's gold supply stimulated global trade and investment. Historians have written extensively about the mass migration, trade, colonization, and environmental history associated with gold rushes.
Gold rushes were typically marked by a general buoyant feeling of a "free-for-all" in
income mobility
Economic mobility is the ability of an individual, family or some other group to improve (or lower) their economic status—usually measured in income. Economic mobility is often measured by movement between income quintiles. Economic mobility ...
, in which any single individual might become abundantly wealthy almost instantly, as expressed in the
California Dream.
Gold rushes helped spur waves of immigration that often led to the permanent settlement of new regions. Activities propelled by gold rushes define significant aspects of the culture of the Australian and
North American frontiers. At a time when the world's money supply was based on
gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...
, the newly-mined gold provided economic stimulus far beyond the goldfields, feeding into local and wider
economic boom
An economic expansion is an increase in the level of economic activity, and of the goods and services available. It is a period of economic growth as measured by a rise in real GDP. The explanation of fluctuations in aggregate economic activi ...
s.
Gold rushes occurred as early as the times of the
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...
, whose gold mining was described by
Diodorus Siculus and
Pliny the Elder, and probably further back to
ancient Egypt.
Life cycle
Within each mining rush there is typically a transition through progressively higher capital expenditures, larger organizations, and more specialized knowledge. They may also progress from high-unit value to lower-unit value minerals (from gold to silver to base metals).
A rush typically begins with the discovery of
placer gold made by an individual. At first the gold may be washed from the sand and gravel by individual miners with little training, using a gold pan or similar simple instrument. Once it is clear that the volume of gold-bearing sediment is larger than a few cubic metres, the
placer miners will build rockers or sluice boxes, with which a small group can wash gold from the sediment many times faster than using gold pans. Winning the gold in this manner requires almost no capital investment, only a simple pan or equipment that may be built on the spot, and only simple organisation. The low investment, the high value per unit weight of gold, and the ability of gold dust and gold nuggets to serve as a medium of exchange, allow placer gold rushes to occur even in remote locations.
After the sluice-box stage, placer mining may become increasingly large scale, requiring larger organisations and higher capital expenditures. Small claims owned and mined by individuals may need to be merged into larger tracts. Difficult-to-reach placer deposits may be mined by tunnels. Water may be diverted by dams and canals to placer mine active river beds or to deliver water needed to wash dry placers. The more advanced techniques of
ground sluicing,
hydraulic mining and
dredging may be used.
Typically the heyday of a placer gold rush would last only a few years. The free gold supply in stream beds would become depleted somewhat quickly, and the initial phase would be followed by prospecting for veins of
lode gold that were the original source of the placer gold. Hard rock mining, like placer mining, may evolve from low capital investment and simple technology to progressively higher capital and technology. The surface outcrop of a gold-bearing vein may be oxidized, so that the gold occurs as native gold, and the ore needs only to be crushed and washed (free milling ore). The first miners may at first build a simple
arrastra to crush their ore; later, they may build
stamp mills to crush ore at greater speed. As the miners venture downwards, they may find that the deeper part of vein contains gold locked in
sulfide or
telluride minerals, which will require
smelting
Smelting is a process of applying heat to ore, to extract a base metal. It is a form of extractive metallurgy. It is used to extract many metals from their ores, including silver, iron, copper, and other base metals. Smelting uses heat and a c ...
. If the ore is still sufficiently rich, it may be worth shipping to a distant smelter (direct shipping ore). Lower-grade ore may require on-site treatment to either recover the gold or to produce a concentrate sufficiently rich for transport to the smelter. As the district turns to lower-grade ore, the mining may change from underground mining to large
open-pit mining.
Many
silver rushes followed upon gold rushes. As transportation and infrastructure improve, the focus may change progressively from gold to silver to base metals. In this way,
Leadville, Colorado started as a placer gold discovery, achieved fame as a silver-mining district, then relied on lead and zinc in its later days.
Butte, Montana began mining placer gold, then became a silver-mining district, then became for a time the world's largest copper producer.
By region
Australia and New Zealand
Various gold rushes occurred in Australia over the second half of the 19th century. The most significant of these, although not the only ones, were the
New South Wales gold rush and
Victorian gold rush in 1851, and the
Western Australian gold rushes of the 1890s. They were highly significant to their respective colonies' political and economic development as they brought many immigrants, and promoted massive government spending on infrastructure to support the new arrivals who came looking for gold. While some found their fortune, those who did not often remained in the colonies and took advantage of extremely liberal land laws to take up farming.
Gold rushes happened at or around:
In New Zealand the
Central Otago Gold Rush from 1861 attracted prospectors from the
California Gold Rush and the
Victorian Gold Rush and many moved on to the
West Coast Gold Rush from 1864.
North America
The first significant gold rush in the United States was in
Cabarrus County, North Carolina (east of Charlotte), in 1799 at today's
Reed's Gold Mine.
Thirty years later, in 1829, the
Georgia Gold Rush
The Georgia Gold Rush was the second significant gold rush in the United States and the first in Georgia, and overshadowed the previous rush in North Carolina. It started in 1829 in present-day Lumpkin County near the county seat, Dahlonega, a ...
in the southern
Appalachians occurred. It was followed by the
California Gold Rush of 1848–55 in the
Sierra Nevada, which captured the popular imagination. The California gold rush led directly to the
settlement of California by Americans and the rapid entry of that state into the union in 1850. The gold rush in 1849 stimulated worldwide interest in prospecting for gold, and led to new rushes in Australia, South Africa, Wales and Scotland. Successive gold rushes occurred in western North America:
Fraser Canyon, the
Cariboo
The Cariboo is an intermontane region of British Columbia, Canada, centered on a plateau stretching from Fraser Canyon to the Cariboo Mountains. The name is a reference to the caribou that were once abundant in the region.
The Cariboo was t ...
district and other parts of British Columbia, in
Nevada
Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...
, in the
Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...
in
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the ...
,
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...
,
Montana, eastern
Oregon, and western
New Mexico Territory and along the lower
Colorado River
The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. s ...
. There was a gold rush in Nova Scotia (1861-1876) which produced nearly 210,000 ounces of gold.
Resurrection Creek, near
Hope, Alaska
Hope is a census-designated place (CDP) in Kenai Peninsula Borough in the U.S. state of Alaska. It is eighty-seven miles south from Anchorage. As of the 2010 census the population was 192, up from 137 in 2000.
Geography
Hope is located at (60 ...
was the site of Alaska's first gold rush in the mid–1890s. Other notable Alaska Gold Rushes were
Nome,
Fairbanks, and the
Fortymile River.
One of the last "great gold rushes" was the
Klondike Gold Rush in Canada's
Yukon Territory
Yukon (; ; formerly called Yukon Territory and also referred to as the Yukon) is the smallest and westernmost of Canada's three territories. It also is the second-least populated province or territory in Canada, with a population of 43,964 as ...
(1896–99). This gold rush is featured in the novels of
Jack London
John Griffith Chaney (January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors to ...
, and
Charlie Chaplin's film ''
The Gold Rush''.
Robert William Service depicted in his poetries the Gold Rush, especially in the book ''
The Trail of '98''. The main goldfield was along the south flank of the
Klondike River near its confluence with the
Yukon River near what was to become
Dawson City in Canada's Yukon Territory, but it also helped open up the relatively new US possession of
Alaska
Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U ...
to exploration and settlement, and promoted the discovery of other gold finds.
The most successful of the North American gold rushes was the
Porcupine Gold Rush
The Porcupine Gold Rush was a gold rush that took place in Northern Ontario starting in 1909 and developing fully by 1911. A combination of the hard rock of the Canadian Shield and the rapid capitalization of mining meant that smaller companies ...
in
Timmins, Ontario area. This gold rush was unique compared to others by the method of extraction of the gold. Placer mining techniques were not able to be used to access the gold in the area due to it being embedded into the
Canadian Shield, so larger mining operations involving significantly more expensive equipment was required. While this gold rush peaked in the 1940s and 1950s, it is still active today with over 200 million ounces of gold having been produced from the region. The gold deposits in this area are identified as one of the largest in the world.
Africa
In South Africa, the
Witwatersrand Gold Rush in the
Transvaal was important to that country's history, leading to the founding of
Johannesburg
Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and xh, eGoli ), colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, or "The City of Gold", is the largest city in South Africa, classified as a Megacity#List of megacities, megacity, and is List of urban areas by p ...
and tensions between the
Boers and British settlers as well as the Chinese miners.
South African gold production went from zero in 1886 to 23% of the total world output in 1896. At the time of the South African rush, gold production benefited from the newly discovered techniques by Scottish chemists,
the MacArthur-Forrest process, of using
potassium cyanide to extract gold from low-grade ore.
South America
The gold mine at El Callao (Venezuela), started in 1871, was for a time one of the richest in the world, and the goldfields as a whole saw over a million ounces exported between 1860 and 1883. The gold mining was dominated by immigrants from the British Isles and the British West Indies, giving an appearance of almost creating an English colony on Venezuelan territory.
Between 1883 and 1906
Tierra del Fuego experienced a gold rush attracting many Chileans, Argentines and Europeans to the archipelago. The gold rush begun in 1884 following discovery of gold during the rescue of the French steamship ''Arctique'' near
Cape Virgenes.
[Martinic Beros, Mateo. ''Crónica de las Tierras del Canal Beagle''. 1973. Editorial Francisco de Aguirre S.A. Pp. 55–65]
Mining industry today
There are about 10 to 30 million small-scale miners around the world, according to Communities and Small-Scale Mining (CASM). Approximately 100 million people are directly or indirectly dependent on small-scale mining. For example, there are 800,000 to 1.5 million
artisanal miners in
Democratic Republic of Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...
, 350,000 to 650,000 in
Sierra Leone, and 150,000 to 250,000 in
Ghana, with millions more across Africa.
In an exclusive report,
Reuters
Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world.
The agency was est ...
accounted the smuggling of billions of dollars' worth of gold out of
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
through the
United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (Middle East, The Middle East). It is ...
in the
Middle East
The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabian Peninsula, Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Anatolia, Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Pro ...
, which further acts as a gateway to the markets in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...
,
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
and more. The news agency evaluated the worth and magnitude of illegal gold trade occurring in African nations like
Ghana,
Tanzania
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands ...
, and
Zambia, by comparing the total gold imports recorded into the UAE with the exports affirmed by the African states. According to Africa's industrial mining firms, they have not exported any amount of gold to the UAE – confirming that the imports come from other, illegal sources. As per customs data, the UAE imported gold worth $15.1 billion from Africa in 2016, with a total weight of 446 tons, in variable degrees of purity. Much of the exports were not recorded in the African states, which means huge volume of gold imports were carried out with no taxes paid to the states producing it.
By date
Before 1860
*
Brazilian Gold Rush,
Minas Gerais
Minas Gerais () is a state in Southeastern Brazil. It ranks as the second most populous, the third by gross domestic product (GDP), and the fourth largest by area in the country. The state's capital and largest city, Belo Horizonte (literall ...
(1695)
*
Carolina Gold Rush
The Carolina Gold Rush, the first gold rush in the United States, followed the discovery of a large gold nugget in North Carolina in 1799, by a 12-year-old boy named Conrad Reed. He spotted the nugget while playing in Meadow Creek on his family's ...
,
Cabarrus County, North Carolina, US (1799)
*
Georgia Gold Rush
The Georgia Gold Rush was the second significant gold rush in the United States and the first in Georgia, and overshadowed the previous rush in North Carolina. It started in 1829 in present-day Lumpkin County near the county seat, Dahlonega, a ...
,
Georgia, US (1828)
*
California Gold Rush (1848–55)
*
Siberian Gold Rush,
Siberia,
Russian Empire
*
Queen Charlottes Gold Rush The Queen Charlottes Gold Rush was a gold rush in southern Haida Gwaii of what is now the North Coast of British Columbia, Canada, in 1851.
The rush was touched off in March 1851 when a Haida man sold a nugget in Fort Victoria for 1,500 blankets ...
,
British Columbia
British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, for ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...
(1850); the first of many
British Columbia gold rushes British Columbia gold rushes were important episodes in the history and settlement of European, Canadian and Chinese peoples in western Canada.
The presence of gold in what is now British Columbia is spoken of in many old legends that, in part, l ...
* Northern Nevada Gold Rush (1850–1934)
*
Victorian gold rush,
Victoria, Australia (1851–late 1860s). Known as the Golden Triangle, it incorporated areas such as
Ararat,
Castlemaine Castlemaine may mean:
* Castlemaine, Victoria, a town in Victoria, Australia
** Castlemaine Football Club, an Australian rules football club
** Castlemaine railway station
* Castlemaine, County Kerry, a town in Ireland
* Castlemaine Brewery, Western ...
,
Marybororgh,
Clunes,
Bendigo,
Ballarat,
Daylesford,
Beechworth, and
Eldorado.
*
Kern River Gold Rush,
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
(1853–58)
* Idaho Gold Rush, near
Colville, Washington
Colville is a city in Stevens County, Washington, United States. The population was 4,673 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Stevens County.
History
John Work, an agent for The Hudson's Bay Company, established Fort Colvile near t ...
(1855; also known as the
Fort Colville
Fort Colville was a U.S. Army post in the Washington Territory located north of current Colville, Washington. During its existence from 1859 to 1882, it was called "Harney's Depot" and "Colville Depot" during the first two years, and finally " ...
Gold Rush)
*
Gila Placers Rush,
New Mexico Territory (present-day
Arizona
Arizona ( ; nv, Hoozdo Hahoodzo ; ood, Alĭ ṣonak ) is a state in the Southwestern United States. It is the 6th largest and the 14th most populous of the 50 states. Its capital and largest city is Phoenix. Arizona is part of the Fou ...
; 1858–59)
*
Fraser Canyon Gold Rush
The Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, (also Fraser Gold Rush and Fraser River Gold Rush) began in 1858 after gold was discovered on the Thompson River in British Columbia at its confluence with the Nicoamen River a few miles upstream from the Thompson's ...
, British Columbia (1858–61)
*
Rock Creek Gold Rush The Rock Creek Gold Rush was a gold rush in the Boundary Country region of the Colony of British Columbia (now part of a Canadian province). The rush was touched off in 1859 when two US soldiers were driven across the border to escape pursuing Ind ...
, British Columbia (1859–60s)
*
Pike's Peak Gold Rush,
Pikes Peak,
Kansas Territory (present-day Colorado; 1859)
1860s
*
Holcomb Valley Gold Rush, California (1860–61)
*
Clearwater Gold Rush,
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...
(1860)
*
Central Otago Gold Rush, New Zealand (1861)
*
Eldorado Canyon Rush,
New Mexico Territory (present-day
Nevada
Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...
; 1861)
*
Colorado River Gold Rush,
Arizona Territory (1862–64)
*
Boise Basin Gold Rush, Idaho (1862)
*
Cariboo Gold Rush, British Columbia (1862–65)
*
Montana Gold Rush (1862–69), including:
**
Bannack,
Virginia City (
Alder Gulch), and
Helena
Helena may refer to:
People
*Helena (given name), a given name (including a list of people and characters with the name)
*Katri Helena (born 1945), Finnish singer
*Helena, mother of Constantine I
Places
Greece
* Helena (island)
Guyana
* H ...
(
Last Chance Gulch) (1862–64)
**
Confederate Gulch (1864–69)
*
Stikine Gold Rush The Stikine Gold Rush was a minor but important gold rush in the Stikine Country of northwestern British Columbia, Canada. The rush's discoverer was Alexander "Buck" Choquette, who staked a claim at Choquette Bar in 1861, just downstream from ...
, British Columbia (1863)
*
Owyhee Gold Rush,
Southeastern Oregon
Southeastern Oregon is a geographical term for the area along the borders of the U.S. state of Oregon with Idaho, California, and Nevada. It includes the populous areas of Burns, Klamath Falls and Lakeview. The region is also known by its nick ...
,
Southwestern Idaho
Southwestern Idaho is a geographical term for the area along the U.S. state of Idaho's borders with Oregon and Nevada. It includes the populous areas of the Boise metropolitan area and Treasure Valley
The Treasure Valley is a valley in the wes ...
(1863)
*
Owens Valley Rush,
Owens Valley, California (1863–64)
*
Leechtown Gold Rush, (south of
Sooke Lake), Leech River,
Vancouver Island (1864–65)
*
West Coast Gold Rush, South Island, New Zealand (1864–67)
*
Big Bend Gold Rush, British Columbia (1865—66)
*
Francistown
Francistown is the second largest city in Botswana, with a population of about 103,417 and 147,122 inhabitants for its agglomeration at the 2022 census. and often described as the "''Capital of the North''" or as the natives would have it “''T ...
Gold Rush,
British Protectorate of Bechuanaland (1867)
*
Omineca Gold Rush, British Columbia (1869)
* Wild Horse Creek Gold Rush, British Columbia (1860s)
* Eastern Oregon Gold Rush (1860s–70s)
*
Kildonan Gold Rush,
Sutherland, Scotland (1869)
1870s
*
Lapland gold rush
The Lapland gold rush, also known as the Ivalo Gold Rush, was a gold rush that occurred in the 1870s in Lapland, Grand Duchy of Finland, then part of Imperial Russia. The Lapland gold rush started in the valley of the Ivalojoki River in 1870 a ...
, Finland, 1870
*
El Callao Gold Rush, Venezuela, 1871
*
Cassiar Gold Rush
The Cassiar Country, also referred to simply as the Cassiar, is a historical geographic region of the Canadian province of British Columbia. The Cassiar is located in the northwest portion of British Columbia, just to the northeast of the Stikin ...
, British Columbia, 1871
*
Palmer River Gold Rush
During the Australian gold rushes, starting in 1851, significant numbers of workers moved from elsewhere in Australia and overseas to where gold had been discovered. Gold had been found several times before, but the colonial government of N ...
,
Palmer River
The Palmer River is a river located in Far North Queensland, Australia. The area surrounding the river was the site of a gold rush in the late 19th century which started in 1873.
Course and features
The headwaters of the Palmer River rise in ...
,
Queensland
)
, nickname = Sunshine State
, image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, establishe ...
, Australia (1872)
*
Pilgrim's Rest, South Africa
Pilgrim’s Rest ( af, Pelgrimsrus) is a small museum town in the Mpumalanga province of South Africa which is protected as a provincial heritage site. It was the second of the Transvaal gold fields, attracting a rush of prospectors in 1873, soon ...
(1873)
*
Black Hills Gold Rush,
Black Hills
The Black Hills ( lkt, Ȟe Sápa; chy, Moʼȯhta-voʼhonáaeva; hid, awaxaawi shiibisha) is an isolated mountain range rising from the Great Plains of North America in western South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, United States. Black ...
of
South Dakota
South Dakota (; Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux Native American tribes, who comprise a large po ...
and
Wyoming
Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to t ...
(1874–78)
* Bodie Gold Rush,
Bodie, California (1876)
* Kumara Gold Rush,
Kumara and Dillmanstown, New Zealand (1876)
[Dollimore, Edward Stewart. �]
"Kumara, Westland"
– '' Encyclopedia of New Zealand (1966)''.
1880s
*
Barberton Gold Rush, South Africa (1883)
*
Witwatersrand Gold Rush,
Transvaal, South Africa (1886); discovery of the
largest deposit of gold in the world. The resulting influx of miners became one of the triggers of the
Second Boer War
The Second Boer War ( af, Tweede Vryheidsoorlog, , 11 October 189931 May 1902), also known as the Boer War, the Anglo–Boer War, or the South African War, was a conflict fought between the British Empire and the two Boer Republics (the So ...
of 1899-1902.
*
Cayoosh Gold Rush in
Lillooet, British Columbia (1884—87)
*
Tulameen Gold Rush, near
Princeton, British Columbia
*
Tierra del Fuego Gold Rush, southernmost
Chile
Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the eas ...
and
Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest ...
(1884–1906)
*
Baja California Gold Rush
Baja or Bája may refer to:
Places and jurisdictions In the Americas
* Baja California Peninsula, in northwestern Mexico
* Baja California state in the northern part of the above peninsula
* Baja California Sur state in the southern part of t ...
, in the
Santa Clara mountains about sixty miles southeast of
Ensenada (1889)
*
Amur
The Amur (russian: река́ Аму́р, ), or Heilong Jiang (, "Black Dragon River", ), is the world's tenth longest river, forming the border between the Russian Far East and Northeastern China (Inner Manchuria). The Amur proper is long ...
gold rush, on the China-Russia border. Some miners in the region formed independent proto-states such as the
Zheltuga Republic.
1890s
*
Cripple Creek Gold Rush
The Cripple Creek Gold Rush was a period of gold production in the Cripple Creek area from the late 1800s until the early 1900s. Mining exchanges were in Cripple Creek, Colorado Springs, Pueblo and Victor. Smelting was in Gillett, Florence, a ...
,
Cripple Creek, Colorado (1891)
*
Western Australian gold rushes,
Kalgoorlie and
Coolgardie, Western Australia (1893, 1896)
*
Mount Baker Gold Rush,
Whatcom County, Washington, United States (1897–1920s)
*
Klondike Gold Rush, centered on
Dawson City,
Yukon, Canada (1896–99)
*
Atlin Gold Rush,
Atlin, British Columbia (1898)
*
Nome Gold Rush
The Nome Gold Rush was a gold rush in Nome, Alaska, approximately 1899–1909.. It is separated from other gold rushes by the ease with which gold could be obtained. Much of the gold was lying in the beach sand of the landing place and could ...
,
Nome, Alaska (1899–1909)
* Fairview Goldrush, Oliver (Fairview), British Columbia, Canada
20th century
*
Fairbanks Gold Rush,
Fairbanks, Alaska (1902–05)
* Goldfield Gold Rush,
Goldfield, Nevada
*
Porcupine Gold Rush
The Porcupine Gold Rush was a gold rush that took place in Northern Ontario starting in 1909 and developing fully by 1911. A combination of the hard rock of the Canadian Shield and the rapid capitalization of mining meant that smaller companies ...
, 1909–11,
Timmins, Ontario, Canada – little known, but one of the largest in terms of gold mined, 67 million ounces as of 2001
*
Iditarod Gold Rush,
Flat, Alaska
Flat is a census-designated place (CDP) in Yukon-Koyukuk Census Area, Alaska, United States. As of the 2010 Census, the population of the CDP was 0, down from 4 residents in 2000. Its post office closed in January 2004.
History
Prospectors Jo ...
, 1910–12, where gold was discovered by
John Beaton
John Beaton is a Scottish football referee.
Career Football
John Beaton became a referee in 2001 and was admitted to the and is known as a list in 2005 before becoming a referee in 2009.
He has refereed at the UEFA U17 Championship Qua ...
and William A. Dikeman in 1908
* Soviet gold rush - notably involving
Gulag
The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the State Political Directorate, GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= ...
slave labor in the
Kolyma region
*
Kakamega gold rush The Kakamega gold rush occurred at Kakamega, Kenya in the early 1930s, fueled partly by the reports of the geologist Albert Ernest Kitson. In his report for the Colonial Office Kitson suggested that possibly as much as half of the gold being prospe ...
, Kenya, 1932
*
Vatukoula Gold Rush, Fiji, 1932
*
Serra Pelada,
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
* Amazon Gold Rush,
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
region, Brazil
* Mount Kare Gold Rush,
Enga Province,
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...
21st century
* Great Mongolian Gold Rush,
Mongolia
Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million ...
(2001)
* Apuí Gold Rush,
Apuí,
Amazonas, Brazil (2006); approximately 500,000 miners are thought to work in the Amazon's "garimpos" (gold mines).
*
Peruvian Amazon gold rush,
Madre de Dios (2009)
*
Tibesti Mountains gold rush,
Chad,
Libya and
Niger (2012)
*Gold rush in
South Kivu,
Democratic Republic of the Congo
The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...
(2021)
See also
*
Bandwagon effect
*
Diamond rush
References
Further reading
* Ngai, Mae. ''The Chinese Question: The Gold Rushes and Global Politics'' (2021), Mid 19c in California, Australia and South Africa
* White, Franklin.'' Miner with a Heart of Gold - Biography of a Mineral Science and Engineering Educator''. FriesenPress. 2020. ISBN 978-1-5255-7765-9 (Hardcover) ISBN 978-1-5255-7766-6 (Paperback) ISBN 978-1-5255-7767-3 (eBook).
External links
Object of History: the Gold Nugget''PBS' American Experience: The Gold Rush''Exploring the California Gold RushThe Australian Gold Rush — illustrated historical essay
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gold Rush
History of money
Western (genre) staples and terminology