The History of Gold Deposits in the Appalachians

Gold on the Eastern Slopes

The Appalachians are folded rock layers pushed up by forces unleashed when the continents of North America, Europe and Africa collided 570 million years ago. Since then, millions of years of erosion have turned its mountains into hills. Old Appalachian rocks forming the Piedmont region eroded so much that only a sloping plateau remains. Generally, gold appears in rock on the Appalachians' eastern slopes. Swampland pushed up against the western slopes created coal deposits that still are commercially mined. North Carolina and Georgia were the centers of Appalachian gold production before demand outstripped supply. Today, the hunt for Appalachian gold is the province of hobbyists and dreamers.

A 12-year-old boy fishing in a North Carolina creek in 1799 is credited with pulling a 17-pound lump from the water that became the first documented gold discovery in the U.S. Unaware of its value, the boy's family used the lump as a doorstop for several years before a visiting merchant recognized its value. He paid the family $3.50 for the gold in 1802, well below the market value of that day, which was $3,600. The boy's father, John Reed, eventually realized the value of what his family had all but given away and founded the Reed Gold Mine in Cabarrus County, N.C. He died a wealthy man.

A major gold find in the Cherokee Nation near Dahlonega, Ga., in 1828 drew thousands of miners and contributed to the "Trail of Tears" expulsion of the Indian tribe from its native land beginning in 1830. So much gold was found that a U.S. Mint was chartered in Dahlonega in 1835. About the same time, another mint to produce gold coins was established in Charlotte, N.C. The outbreak of the Civil War put a stop to production at both mints in 1861.

Dahlonega's gold heydays were in the 1840s, and after the discovery of gold at John Sutter's sawmill in 1848, miners began leaving northern Georgia for California. In North Carolina, the early 1900s marked the end of gold mining as a significant economic factor. Neither state is among the top 10 in U.S. gold production, according to National Mining Association survey that ranks Alaska, Arizona and California as the top three.