MOOERS’ GOLD BONANZA

(For other stories about the California Desert click on Desert Explorer at
www.dustyway.com)

An interesting scarp-line extends from the San Andreas fault near Gorman to Searles Dry
Lake located southwest of Death Valley. This lesser-known Garlock Fault has within its
reach some interesting history related to the discovery of gold. And, where there’s gold
there has to be a story worth telling.

John Goler entered California by way of Death Valley. This short-cut to the gold fields
of California proved disastrous for most of those who chose it. Goler’s trip was no
exception. According to his story, as told by others, after days of travel across mountains
and down dry valleys, delirious and dehydrated, he stumbled on a spring of fresh water.
While resting and recuperating from his unimaginable Death Valley adventure he looked
down at his bare feet. And, as often happens with desert yarns, an unsuspecting sufferer
was rewarded with a gold nugget winking between his toes.

Goler went on to settle in Los Angeles and became a prominent member of the
community operating a profitable foundry. Eventually, he returned to the El Paso
Mountains where he believed the spring to be located but is unable to find it. A canyon
in that range carries his name to this day.

The first lode mine, in the El Paso Mountains, opened in the mid ‘50s and proved to be
successful. Others followed. From that early time, prospectors combed the peaks and
canyons of this range looking for a promising outcrop. But the real find wasn’t made
until the early 1890s when a chunk of placer gold weighing 56 troy ounces was found at
some depth in a wash below one of the south facing canyons. In no time, dry washes
and banks of gulches filled with men and contraptions designed to sift through sand and
gravel for the elusive metal.
 The settlement of Garlock provided boarding houses,
saloons and a few stores to serve the growing placer
camps. It had started as a watering hole for cattle
trailed from the High Sierras to the warmer winter
range on the desert. The place got its name from
Eugene Garlock who established a gold mill there to
take advantage of the water.

Fredrick Mitchell Mooers described as tall, lean, bearded and well educated, left his
position with a Los Angeles newspaper and joined the rush to Golar Canyon. By the time
he arrived, the good pickings had been claimed forcing him along with other late arrivers
to work the gravels farther out where four dollars a day of hard work was an average
take.

Born in Ithaca New York in 1847, Mooers spent his early adult years as an accountant for
a large drug company headquartered in the Manhattan district of New York City. He
married and eventually became manager of the Brooklyn Eagle newspaper.
Many young men in his position dreamed of leaving home and joining a gold rush
somewhere out west.

With Mooers, the dream became an obsession, Beset and haunted by the thought of
finding gold, he finally did what many other family men had done at that time. He left
his well paying job, his wife and young son and traveled west to seek his fortune in the
mining camps of Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, New Mexico Arizona and finally
California

Mooers claimed to have studied geology and eagerly discussed with his partner the
likelihood that the small range of hills ten miles to the south might have gold bearing ore.
Placer work had stopped because, as we know, wet gravel can’t be dry washed. And, the
rains that spring would likely keep the washes unworkable until June according to old
timers.

During that interlude, Mooers decided to test his theory, “ I was there [ Rand
Mountains] in 1894, made a hurried trip and had built a monument right in what proved
to be the very heart of the bonanza. I had only a canteen of water with me at the time
and was glad to get back to camp, with my tongue hanging out.”

Mooers and his partner John Singleton ask Charlie Burcham to join them because Charlie
had a team and wagon that they would need to haul supplies to the site. He agreed to join
if they would pay for the hay that his mules would need. Over the next few days, they
quietly gathered “picks, shovels, drills, powder, mortar and pestle, horn spoon” and
rations. To throw off suspicion, they told their placer mining neighbors that they were
quitting and returning to San Bernardino.
.
The three made camp and started prospecting in the area that Mooers had marked.
 A large quartz outcrop “unbelievably rich and six feet wide” stood at the head of a
canyon. The top of the ledge had decomposed to gravel and flakes of gold that could be
recovered in a dry washer. They badly needed money to pay for a survey of their claims
before word of the discovery got out. Mooers and Singleton stayed to protect and marked
the boundary while Burcham took his team to San Bernardino where he recorded the
claims. They named their mine “Yellow Aster”.

Fortune smiled when O.B. Stanton an investor, and his mining engineer, a man named
Brown, rode into camp. After inspecting the ledge Stanton made a generous offer to
option the property and to construct a mill. Mooers and Singleton, tired and hungry for
success, signed an agreement and promised that they would get Burcham to sign when he
got back.

Burcham, unaware of the deal, told his wife about their discovery and signed over half of
his one-third interest to her. When he arrived back at the camp the partners joyfully told
him about the offer and he agreed but told them that he had given his wife half of his
interest.

Dr. Rose La Monte Burcham got her training

at the Medical Institute of Cincinnati and came
to California to practice. She married Charlie
Burcham, a cattle rancher, and they took
residence in the city of San Bernardino.
In a word, she refused to sign the agreement
to sell her one-sixth interest – Stanton would
have to look elsewhere.

As it turns out, the three original partners

owed their fortune to Dr. Rose who took
management of the mines, put a lock on the
bank account, fought numerous law suits that
arose and gave union bosses a good licking.
When the infamous one-arm mining attorney
Pat Reddy tried to horn in on the property, she
quietly filed incorporation papers forcing
Reddy to settle for a few shares of stock in the new company. He swore to friends that he
hoped to never again deal with the like of that woman.

At first, ore from the original shafts and tunnels was shipped to the Garlock Mill for
processing. Later, two mills with a total of 100 stamps were completed on the property
and by the end of ‘98 the company was paying substantial dividends to investors. The
mines continued to produce returns until 1917.
 Randsburg would have been a hard place to
describe. Tents and simple wood framed
houses dotted the hillsides with no sense of
order. Business activities crowded both sides
of Butte Street where business lots sold for
outrageous prices. As new mines opened, the
population grew. A railroad constructed from
the Santa Fe line at Kramer eventually reached
as far north as Johannesburg and was active
until competition from a Southern Pacific line
to the north caused it to discontinue service.

Fights, shootings and rowdy behavior was tolerated until a gang called the Dirty Dozen
took over the town. The position of constables had no takers which meant that there was
no one to enforce the law until the mine owners got together and hired Tex Lovett.
Lovett, like most lawmen, never spoke above a whisper and went quietly about the
business of rounding up gang members one by one and hauling them before the court.
The local postmaster who was also justice-of-the-peace supported Lovett’s effort and
ordered the culprits to leave town that day with warning that if they returned they could
become the subject of a hanging. The purge was a success.

The three partners built sizable homes in the town but spent most of their time traveling
and investing their fortunes in other places including the city of Los Angeles and San
Bernardino County.

Mooers liked his whisky straight and spent time in local taverns. One afternoon he got
into a heated argument with his driver over some minor disagreement. When the
argument got beyond words, Mooers gave the man a shove causing him to fall back and
strike his head on a large silver spittoon. His death was ruled an accident. Most deaths
by knife, bullet or fist were ruled either self defense or an accident.

Mooers’ family and friends had heard nothing from him for over twenty years and had
no ideal where he had finally settled. When news of the Yellow Aster bonanzas reached
the East Coast his name took space in every newspaper in the state of New York. Upon
that news, his wife acquired a divorce and one million shares of Yellow Aster stock.

Mooers bought a stylish Victorian house in Los Angels in hopes of winning the return of
his wife but she would have nothing to do with him or the house. Disheartened by her
refusal, he returned to New York in 1899 and died of heart failure in 1900 at the age of
52.
 “Mooers House” is located at 818 South Bonnie Brae, Los
Angeles. It has been described as a good example of
“eclectic” architecture and has gained local recognition as a
historical monument. We visited and photographed the
house a few months ago.

Randsburg remains a living relict of an early 20th Century

mining town and a “must visit” for
anyone interested in the California Desert.

The few remains of Garlock, are well protected behind chain link fences. The site is
located on Randsburg Road at Google Earth.35
24.100; 117 47.431.

A friend and I found some cyanide vats that were used in the 1930 to process mine
tailings from the Garlock Mill. They are located across the railroad tracks from the
Garlock site.