Souvenir Mining Spoons

Souvenir Mining Spoon Empire Mine Reverse | SOUVENIR MINING SPOON EMPIRE MINE GRASS VALLEY CA - Sterling silver souvenir spoon, features handle with figural miner behind pan with gold nuggets and pick and shovel, flower with deep relief decoration down the handle, bowl has engraved image of mining scene, marking is EMPIRE MINE, GRASS VALLEY, CAL., measures 4" in length , reverse marked STERLING with hallmark of H on a pennant for Mechanics Sterling Company, which was subsidiary of Watson Newell Co. [The city of Grass Valley is the largest city in the western region of Nevada County, California. Situated at roughly 2,500 feet elevation in the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, this historic northern Gold Country city is 57 miles north by northeast from the state capitol in Sacramento. Grass Valley, which was originally known as Boston Ravine and later officially named Centerville, dates from the California Gold Rush, as does nearby Nevada City. When a post office was established in 1851, it was renamed Grass Valley the following year. The town incorporated in 1860. Grass Valley is the location of the Empire Mine and North Star Mine, two of the oldest, largest, deepest, longest and richest gold mines in California. Many of those who came to settle in Grass Valley were tin miners from Cornwall, England. They were attracted to the California gold fields because the same skills needed for deep tin mining were needed for hard rock (deep) gold mining. Many of them specialized in pumping the water out of very deep mining shafts. George Roberts identified the Ophir Hill vein, which would eventually become the Empire Mine, which along with the Northstar Mine and the Idaho Maryland Mine would eventually produce nearly $300 million worth of gold. The Northstar and Idaho Maryland mines are discussed elsewhere in my Souvenir Mining Spoons pics. Roberts founded the Empire mine in 1851. In 1852, the mine was purchased by the Empire Mining Company, which maintained mines throughout the area. Controlling interest of the mine changed hands several times throughout the 1850s, when many of the individual placer miners began to flee for Virginia City, Nev., looking to cash in on Nevada's burgeoning Silver Rush. By 1869, William Bourn Sr. procured controlling interest in the company and the Bourn family would maintain control of the mine until 1929, when they sold it to Newmont Mining. When Bourn Sr. died in 1874, his namesake, William Bourn Jr., assumed operation of the mine that most engineers believed had been picked clean over the past decades. Undaunted, Bourn Jr., just 21 years old at the time, poured money into exploration of the underground workings, that within four years continued to yield copious amounts of gold. With his younger cousin, George Starr in tow, the two men transformed the plodding gold producer into a world-class showcase for modern mining, utilizing the Cornish miners' technological innovation of using steam pumps to keep the underground workings dry. At its zenith, the mine employed more than 400 miners, who would board ore cars 20 at a time and be lowered rapidly down an incline to nearly 11,000 feet below the surface. All told, the mine comprised 367 miles of underground workings. In 1929, Bourn Jr. sold the mine to the Newmont Mining Corp. for $250,000, which operated the mine continuously until the advent of World War II, when the War Production Board forced the shutdown of the mine. The War Production Board's decision was in stark contrast to the Abraham Lincoln's policy toward the gold mines in California during the American Civil War, as much of the precious metals that were disinterred during his administration were sold to augment The Union's coffers and bolster its war machine. The mine opened briefly again in the 1950s, but the price of gold had plummeted so far that it was unprofitable to run the Empire Mine and it was closed for good in 1956. Between 1851 and its closure in 1956, the Empire Mine produced 5.8 million ounces of gold. In April 1975, Newmont sold the mine to the state of California for $1.25 million and the California Parks Department transformed the nearly 800 acres of land into one of the most visited vestiges of the California Gold Rush. The Empire Mine State Historic Park is a state-protected mine and park in Grass Valley, California. The park is on the National Register of Historic Places, a federal Historic District, and a California Historical Landmark.]

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