THE HISTORIC PRINCESS DITCH TRAIL; A MODERN HIKING TRAIL WITH AN ADIT QUARTZ MINE?

Located 7.4 miles west of Redding on Muletown Road is the historic Princess Ditch. This ditch was formerly owned and operated by the Princess Hydraulic Mining Company of Leadville, Colorado. It was dug out by their employees during 1896 and it was completed in January of 1897. From the source of its water supply at Boulder Creek in the present day, Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, its purpose was to convey water to the various quartz mines in the Muletown mining district and to the company's hydraulic mining operations which were situated in Secs. 25 and 26, Township 31, North Range 6 West, and consisted of three hundred acres of patented mineral land.

According to records, there was a drift mine of natural bedrock, and two fifty ft., shafts on the property. This historic water ditch operated in the late 19th Century, and during the early 1900s, by special permit obtained from the California Debris Commision. This permit allowed the Princess Hydrualic Mining Company to operate their hydraulic mining site in Shasta County, even though hydraulic mining had been outlawed in California since 1884. Their last permit was obtained by them in January of 1903, as their hydraulic mining operations continued, the Princess Hydraulic Mining Company was ordered to terminate their hydraulic mining activities due to their retaining wall which was condemned by the California Debris Commission. Their hydraulic mining operations has been idled since 1903. 

A century later, in 2014, this historic mining ditch was converted into a modern hiking trail. Those involved in the project were: the Bureau of Land Management, Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, the McConnell Foundation, the State Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, among other groups. They connected the Princess Ditch to additional trails in the area. Altogether the trail is a one-way 8.5 mile trail system, moderate to strenuous in parts, which connects with the Mule Ridge trail and the Salt Creek Loop trail. 

Above video: "An Abandoned Adit Quartz Mine, On the Historic Princess Ditch Trail." Filmed by Jeremy Tuggle on 7-20-2020.

In 2018, this modern hiking trail was destroyed by the ravaging flames of the deadly Carr Fire. Two years later, the trail system has grown back to its natural state, yet scarring from the fire remains visible. This trail is maintained by the National Park Service.

People can take the trail from its parking lot at the Oak Knoll Trailhead and can walk through some of its original course. However, the trail has its secrets, and one of them is a moderate to strenuous walk on a short over-grown mining road with fallen trees and poison oak. This mining road leads to an unnamed adit quartz mine which is hidden uphill off the trail from public viewing. From the start of the trail system at its parking lot on Muletown Road is a 0.2 hike to the mine's tunnel (if you know where to look for it). This adit quartz mine could have been owned by the Princess Hydraulic Mining Company since they had a drift tunnel on their property. 

Yet, it's a possibility that this adit quartz mine is part of the nearby Anavina Group of Mines also known as the Peerless mines, a series of five claims which were lucrative in gold, and located by miners in 1885, to work the mine as a placer mines which later converted into a quartz mine. The original name of the mine is not known to me, and I haven’t found it on any topographic maps of the area but it is an intriguing adit quartz mine which was mined for gold. With cool air flow circulating through this abandoned quartz claim, the tunnel measures an estimated 400 feet that's well worth the time and energy to check out, but as always be safe when entering old mines and take the necessary equipment you need with you.

RESOURCES:

Miners Want Water - The Los Angeles Herald newspaper of Los Angeles, August 11, 1897

The California Debris Commission - The San Francisco Call newspaper of San Francisco, January 18, 1903.

REPORT XIV OF THE STATE MINERALOGIST - MINES AND MINERAL RESOURCES OF CALIFORNIA - CHAPTERS OF STATE MINERALOGIST'S  REPORT BIENNIAL PERIOD, 1913-1914. CALIFORNIA STATE MINING BUREAU, CALIFORNIA STATE PRINTING OFFICE, SACRAMENTO. Page 797.

Mines and Mineral Resources of Shasta County, Siskiyou County, and Trinity County, by G. Chester Brown, ©1915 published by California State Printing Office.

Place Names of Shasta County by Gertrude A. Steger revision by Helen Hinckley Jones, ©1966 by La Siesta Press, Glendale, California

Mines and Mineral Resources of Shasta County, California – County Report 6 – by Philip A. Lydon and J.C. O’ Brien ©1974 by California Division of Mines and Geology

The Princess Ditch and the Princess Hydraulic Mining Company; Historic Background Research, Evaluation of Significance, and Recommendations. Bureau of Land Management, Redding Field Office. Barbara Woodrum ©2011 

Environmental Assessment and Assessment of Effect Princess Ditch Trail Construction March 2014 National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Whiskeytown National Recreation Area

Fun Trails With Great Views And Variety Of Terrains by Laura Christman - The Record Searchlight newspaper of Redding, April 25, 2017

Whiskeytown National Recreation Area Announces The Re-Opening of the Princess Ditch Trail - November 24, 2019

Anavina Group of Mines 

A Celebrated Producer of Gold: The Washington Mine

Miners working the vein of the Washington mine on the Washington mine property, date unknown. Courtesy of Shasta Historical Society.

Located about 2.4 miles north west of French Gulch in the French Gulch mining district is the Washington mine. The mine was located in 1852 by prospectors John Souter and John Syme. Together the original locators began working it as a placer mine. Through exploration work they discovered a decomposed oxidized outcropping vein of gold; they dubbed it the North-South vein. This vein became one of the two principal veins on the property and they began sluicing it.

This vein's yield was so tremendous that the owners began driving adits on the mining property and formed a major quartz mining operation. The Washington mine became the first gold quartz mine in Shasta County, as well as the first patented mine. Souter and Syme were quite pleased with the progress they were making; the two prospectors established the Washington Quartz Company and shares of stocks were split up between the partners that included: Emanuel Lewin, W.B. Stoddard, S.C. Snouch, Henry Warner, William Watson and additional parties.

The Shasta Courier newspaper, reported the following about the Washington Qaurtz Company on Saturday, April 16, 1853: “WASHINGTON QUARTZ COMPANY – The vein owned by this company has been yielding the most satisfactory results ever since it has been opened. Indeed we have sufficient evidence to justify the belief that this vein is not surpassed by richness in the State, and we are informed by Mr. Fehley that the vein cannot be worked out for years. We believe there is none of this company’s stock for sale. The company is composed of practical miners-men who do their own work, and consequently they have no more stampers employed than just a sufficient to keep a dozen or two of men profitably employed. They intend during the summer, however, to increase the extent of their operations, and take out the ore in still greater amounts. At present, all of the stockholders, if we are not much mistaken, are very quietly getting rich fast. Well, they are a good set of fellows, and deserve just such luck.”

By May of 1853, the mine produced a grand total of $2,181, and on September 17, 1853, the Shasta Courier reported, “A BIG LUMP – Mr. Swartz of the Washington Quartz Company, brought into our office the other day, a lump of amalgam weighing 20 lbs., and worth $3,864, the product of less than a week’s worth of work. He also exhibited to us several of the richest specimens of gold bearing quartz, taken from their vein, that it has ever been our privilege to behold. A short time since this company lost the track of their lead, but are now upon it again, and at present find it more productive than here to fore.”

Another principal vein on the mining property was the East-West vein, both veins were assayed at $600 per ton in gold, and up until 1854, the mine yielded an astonishing production total of $53,232. Further enhancements were made on the property during 1855 consisting of three shallow shafts and additional tunnel work. Their stamp mill continued crushing the ore of the mine on a regular basis. On March 18, 1868 a storm blew through the area and flooded the creeks above the mine causing severe damage to the mill located below. The stamp mill had to be rebuilt and the following year additional stamps were added making it a twenty-two stamp mill. That year the output reached $45,722 in gold. At the same time Syme became Superintendent and held that title until 1875.

The Washington Quartz Mining Company had a large pay roll of employees including Reverend William S. Kidder, a pioneer Baptist minister. A terrible incident on March 25, 1871 lead to the death of one of those employees. William J. Christopher was mining in a tunnel with his partner James Sinclair and fell down a 110 foot shaft. The company sent for Dr. Benjamin Shurtleff of Shasta and Dr. Thompson Plumb of French Gulch to examine him. Unfortunately Christopher died as a result of the fall. Accidental deaths and additional severe injuries would occur at the mine. Despite the dangers of the job, by the end of the year in 1871, the mine’s output reached a remarkable $31,153 in gold.

After 1872 the mine produced such staggering results that additional tunneling work was neccessay. Mining at the site continued well into the 1880’s. Souter and Syme retained ownership of the mine and the shareholders of the Washington Quartz Mining Company created a Board of Directors. In 1890, Shasta County mining reports estimated the mines production total between $500,000 to $600,000. Mining operations eventually became dormant at the mine. In 1891 further exploration work was being conducted. According to an excerpt from a state mineralogist report on the Washington mine, printed by the Shasta Courier newspaper on February 21, 1891: “The mine was opened by driving tunnels, five in number and are known as follows:No. 1 - 500 feetNo. 2 - 700 feetNo. 3 1/2 - 300 feetNo. 4 - 1,100 feetOriginal Crosscut - 1,380 feetThe cost of running the tunnels has varied from $3.50 to $13.50 per foot. The greatest vertical depth reached in the mine is four hundred and eighty feet. The length of ore shoot as far as known is four hundred feet."

By the date of the newpaper article the company cut and graded a fifteen mile road to and from the mine. During March of 1898, a miner named William Blagrave made a lucrative strike inside the Washington mine. He located a pocket which was reported to be assayed at $20,000, and the news of this strike was heralded across California.

According to the Sacramento Daily Union newspaper the mine was sold on March 9, 1907 to Farley & Mitchell for a total of $150,000. Work continued under the new ownership and in 1912 the production at the mine totaled between one and two million dollars of gold. The ore was treated by a pan-amalgamation and the results of this operation were favorable.

The Washington mine, date unknown. Courtesy of Shasta Historical Society.

Work at the mine was steady up until 1920. The Great Depression had a major impact on the mine and it experienced another period of dormancy. However, on March 15, 1922, interest in the mine developed and eventually a five stamp mill began crushing the ore of the mine, sporadically. Sporadic mining activity continued from 1942 through 1969. Between the 1970’s and 1990 the Washington mine was controlled by several different owners including Harry Feutrier and Tom Neal.

During 1990 a large strike occurred in the Washington mine in a vein which was dubbed as the Lucky 7. In 2004 the French Gulch Nevada Gold Mining Corporation purchased this celebrated mining property; a subsidiary company owned by the Bullion River Gold Corporation of Reno, Nevada. The mine is currently an active mining site under new ownership and mining operations on the property continue to yield rich deposits.

RESOURCES:

Place Names of Shasta County by Gertrude A. Steger revision by Helen Hinckley Jones, ©1966 by La Siesta Press, Glendale, California

Mines and Mineral Resources of Shasta County, California – County Report 6 – by Philip A. Lydon and J.C. O’ Brien ©1974 by California Division of Mines and Geology

Shasta Gold Corporation Website

A Celebrated Producer of Gold: the Washington Mine by Jeremy Tuggle - The Record Searchlight newspaper of Redding, November 11, 2016

THE HISTORIC FRANKLIN MINE

Located approximately two miles north-west of French Gulch in the French Gulch mining district and in Franklin Gulch was the Franklin mine. A lucrative producer of gold, originally located by pioneers John Syme and his mining partner John Souter in 1852. It became the second quartz mine in Shasta County. It was later owned by the Franklin Mining Company who named themselves after the mine they had purchased. About 1910, owners erected a small stamp mill on the property and began to crush the rock for the ore they were after. Between 1907 and 1912, the Franklin mine produced $350,000 from three of it's four levels of operations and the production continued through various owners. From 1907 through the 1940's this gold mine was worked by the Western Exploration Company- and, or their leases after the J.H. Scott Company leased it during the 1930s. The J.H. Scott Company owned it from the second World War on. It was then abandoned, and then in the 1960s the Franklin mine passed into the hands of the Mountain Copper Company of Martinez, California. Later on, different people bought it until the mine laid idled and abandoned again. Now it remains an interesting place to visit, but use caution, be alert and take the necessary equipment you need with you. Mines can be dangerous at times. Enjoy the video.

RESOURCES: 

Place Names of Shasta County by Gertrude A. Steger revision by Helen Hinckley Jones, ©1966 by La Siesta Press, Glendale, California

Mines and Mineral Resources of Shasta County, California – County Report 6 – by Philip A. Lydon and J.C. O’ Brien ©1974 by California Division of Mines and Geology

REMEMBERING BIG WHEELS RESTAURANT IN SHINGLETOWN

Above: Big Wheels Restaurant, date unknown. Courtesy of Shasta Historical Society.

Who remember's Big Wheels Restaurant at Shingletown? It was in 1939 when Harry Abbott established it after opening a trading post along Highway 44, Abbott included a set of big wheels as shown in the above photograph which would forever become its trademark and it help promote his establishment to passing motorists. You can see that the big wheels were taller than his buildings on the property.

Abbott purchased the big wheels in 1936, three years before his establishment's grand opening. Abbot was a natural businessman who also founded a gas station, grocery store, bar and a dance hall on the property. You might remember the large circular saw in the lobby of the restaurant? It seems to be a popular memory for a lot of people who ate there. Abbott eventually sold the business to new owners.

Various owners had operated this popular eatery and among them were Carole and Richard Smith, under their ownership an extensive gift shop was added. The Smith’s sold out to Dave and Mary Thomas, and they owned it for for a good ten year period. The place was bought numerous times after the Thomas’s sold out.

Then on, January 1, 1997, fire destroyed the Big Wheels Restaurant which left it's original chimney standing. The popular eatery was rebuilt, and yet to some people it just wasn't the same, and on May 16, 2005, a second fire ravaged the property which destroyed everything inside the new restaurant portion and left the chimney standing again. Eventually, it had passed into the ownership of Mike Dastrup. The only item left to view on the property is the large brick chimney fire place. At the present date, this chimney still stands on this property in Shingletown.

Above: the large brick chimney fire place still stands at the site of Big Wheels Restaurant off Highway 44 at Shingletown. This photograph was taken by Jeremy Tuggle on June 28, 2018.

Above: a side view of the large brick chimney fire place. This photograph was taken by Jeremy Tuggle on June 28, 2018.

RESOURCES:

Shingletown Businesss Directory 

Shingletown VF 979.424 Towns on file at Shasta Historical Society

Menu's From Various County Restaurants - VF 642 on file at Shasta Historical Society

The Yankee John mine.

The Yankee John mine was located by miners in 1858, part of the Centerville mining district near Redding, Shasta County, California. It had various owners through the years. Between 1926 and 1932 the Yankee John mine yielded $83,000 worth of gold. The mine was abandoned in 1962.  It's still an intriguing place to visit west of Redding via Placer/Simmons Road. BLM maintains this historical mining site.