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Jackson, California, was founded in 1848, and, like other towns in the area, its settlement was stimulated by the discovery of gold by James Marshall in Coloma, thirty-five miles away. Initially just a mining camp built around a year-round spring, Jackson became a convenient supply and resting place for travelers journeying from Sacramento to the Southern Mines. By 1850, the population had reached around 1,500.

Jackson was named the seat of newly formed Amador County in 1854. Prior to that, aided by messy, gold-mining-era politics, it was the county seat of Calaveras County. Set in the sidewalk of Main Street in Jackson, a plaque has the following wording:

“Judge Smith proclaimed Jackson the seat of Justice after Clerk Collier canvassed the votes of the May 1851 election in which 1,224 votes were cast for Moquelumne Hill and 1,014 for Jackson. An armed party from Moquelumne Hill pursued Judge Smith to lynch him. Another party stole the records from the Clerk’s office. Later Judge Smith shot and killed Collier on Main Street over another disputed election count. A perfect example of Mother Lode politics.”

In May 1854, the governor of California appeased enraged Moquelumne Hill citizens and signed a bill allowing Calaverans to vote on forming a new county. The vote was so corrupt that the results were—and still are—unclear, but nonetheless, the new county, Amador, was created, and in July 1854, five-year-old Jackson, described at the time as “having over 100 homes, some two-story,” earned enough votes to be named county seat.

In 1862, much of downtown Jackson was burned in a fire, and the town rebuilt, this time in brick and stone. Many of those buildings are standing today. Jackson tutors and teachers can visit some of these sites to help their students learn California history.

That fire was not the only one that devastated Jackson. In 1922, Jackson made headlines when forty-seven miners, mostly Italian Spanish, and Serbian immigrants, died in a fire in the Argonaut Mine, 4,650 feet below the ground—the worst gold-mine disaster in U.S. history. It took over a year to recover the bodies.

The source of the Argonaut Mine fire was never determined; some say it was arson from nearby competitor Kennedy Gold Mine, also a huge moneymaker for Jackson. At the time of its closing in 1942, Kennedy had produced gold worth over $34 million—and this was when gold was valued at $20.67 and $35.00 per ounce. Between 1886 and 1937, the company paid its stockholders $5.8 million in dividends, of which 95% had been determined by a gold value of $20.67 per ounce.

A good way to learn more about Jackson’s rich Gold Rush history is to take the Jackson walking tour, consisting of twenty-one bronze plaques that mark historic buildings and sites. Jackson tutors and teachers can take this walking tour with their students for a vivid way to learn the history of California’s Gold Rush days.