The Lost Breyfogle Gold Mine

[KANACKI]

Today the mine is tourist attraction as it now part of the Death Valley national park. As see the pictures today of its present condition.







Was the Keane Wonder Mine the actual location of the gold reef Breyfogle found in 1862? While possible we shall never know for sure because that is enduring mystery of lost mines legends. You just never know?

Kanacki

 

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[BillA]

Oroblanco and Kanacki - nice thread

 

[Ryano]

Fascinating stuff.. looking at the satellite photos of the Rhyolite area the terrain certainly looks transformed by surface mining .. though I wonder about the tiny little town of Beatty and what kind of life is worth living there today. Doesn't seem to be any industry left.. I wonder how the locals eke out a living in that barren place ? Surely they can't all be Wild West tour guides .

 

[KANACKI]

Fascinating stuff.. looking at the satellite photos of the Rhyolite area the terrain certainly looks transformed by surface mining .. though I wonder about the tiny little town of Beatty and what kind of life is worth living there today. Doesn't seem to be any industry left.. I wonder how the locals eke out a living in that barren place ? Surely they can't all be Wild West tour guides .

Hello Ryano its Sadly an all to common occurrence which is the driving force creating ghost towns. Beatty in the end of the 20th century most likely took over from the demise of Rhyolite in the early 20th century as principle base for local mining operations. But as soon as the ore body gives out towns like that are destined to eventually become a ghost towns.

After being in mining industry over 30 years it is roller coaster of boom and bust. Sadly I know all too well the social impacts miners face as they can rarely put down roots.

Kanacki

 

[Kauziamos]

I caught the bug, for a life of adventure! And I’m sure I have all the luck! Be it good or bad, quien sabe? Light the way!

 

[Oroblanco]

Yet another version of the tale, and of course another mine being proposed as "the" lost Breyfogle - the Royal Flush!


From Los Angeles Herald, Volume 36, Number 53, 23 November 1908 — LOST MINE MAY BE ROYAL FLUSH

Another different first name this time it is JOHN Breyfogle who finds the ledge.

Definitely more coffee!

 

[JohnWhite]

So many articles and yet the question still remains...Is said mine in question the one so many have sought or isn't itInquiring minds would like to know...Yet the adventurer will always doubt the it has been found...Just for the thrill of seeking it for theirselves...

Ed T

 

[KANACKI]

I caught the bug, for a life of adventure! And I’m sure I have all the luck! Be it good or bad, quien sabe? Light the way!

Nothing wrong with that but just remember a miner has a short shelf life. You get in make your money then run. Mining is a dirty business my friend I have seen it make and break people and chew them out the other side.

I worked for several mining exploration teams contracted to Drilling exploration for large multinational mining companies drilling ( Truth Holes) in various countries around the world. Yet it comes at a high price because being away for so long can ruin relationships and tear families apart. Divorce was common for married men and for single guys it was indeed great a life of adventure but you can never have a steady relationship because you moving from camp to camp. Eventually I diverged with other private business projects some not even related to mining. I now have multiple incomes and is retired. In the last 20 years or so I have sailed around the world 3 times.

Today I live on a island in the Pacific. So I have used mining as a means to what I want to be an do and where I want to be. Do I miss it hell yeah! Would I want to go back to it? Hell no!

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

So many articles and yet the question still remains...Is said mine in question the one so many have sought or isn't itInquiring minds would like to know...Yet the adventurer will always doubt the it has been found...Just for the thrill of seeking it for theirselves...

Ed T

Well said my friend your becoming quite the philosopher.

Kanacki

 

[JohnWhite]

Nothing wrong with that but just remember a miner has a short shelf life. You get in make your money then run. Mining is a dirty business my friend I have seen it make and break people and chew them out the other side.

I worked for several mining exploration teams contracted to Drilling exploration for large multinational mining companies drilling ( Truth Holes) in various countries around the world. Yet it comes at a high price because being away for so long can ruin relationships and tear families apart. Divorce was common for married men and for single guys it was indeed great a life of adventure but you can never have a steady relationship because you moving from camp to camp. Eventually I diverged with other private business projects some not even related to mining. I now have multiple incomes and is retired. In the last 20 years or so I have sailed around the world 3 times.

Today I live on a island in the Pacific. So I have used mining as a means to what I want to be an do and where I want to be. Do I miss it hell yeah! Would I want to go back to it? Hell no!

Kanacki

I too miss it Kanacki...But I am also like you with wanting to go back...lol...We say hell no and we mean hell yeah!!!

One of these days...I hope that I will be able to make it back to Reno...I have been bitten by the darned diamond bug and I haven't found a cure for it...I have been thinking about saving up a grubstake and heading out under the stars for 3 weeks...Who knows...One way or the other I will find a cure for the darned bite...Maybe it was just a piece of quartz...I may never know...10,000,000 to 1 odds are something else and a billion to one odds are crazy...

Only time will tell...I believe that I am running out of time...Oh well...Maybe some young whippersnapper will come along and overcome those odds...We'll just have to wait and see...

Ed T

 

[KANACKI]

Yet another version of the tale, and of course another mine being proposed as "the" lost Breyfogle - the Royal Flush!

View attachment 1798164
From Los Angeles Herald, Volume 36, Number 53, 23 November 1908 — LOST MINE MAY BE ROYAL FLUSH

Another different first name this time it is JOHN Breyfogle who finds the ledge.

Definitely more coffee!

Thanks once again for the excellent post. It excellent example on how names change and the details become more and more confused over time. This is an excellent example of how even newspaper over time their reported forget, misquote or creatively add things to stories. I love all these newspaper stories but over time become weary of relying on them alone. Although they are an excellent resource they still need to be fact checked with variable records to get at truth.

This 1903 newspaper below.

Dungog Chronicle : Durham and Gloucester Advertiser (NSW : 1894 - 1954), Friday 25 December 1903, page 3



As you can news of Breyfogale story was being told in newspapers all around the world after about 1890. Claims claim and more claims .

Another area where this alleged gold reef was........

Coffee I sure need it.....

Kanacki

 

[Oroblanco]

Breyfogles

Kanacki wrote

Thanks once again for the excellent post. It excellent example on how names change and the details become more and more confused over time. This is an excellent example of how even newspaper over time their reported forget, misquote or creatively add things to stories. I love all these newspaper stories but over time become weary of relying on them alone. Although they are an excellent resource they still need to be fact checked with variable records to get at truth.

My apologies, it was not my intention to belabor your patience by posting the newspaper articles. The only idea was to include the many different versions, which may be something other than the obvious explanation of the authors confusing, confabulating, and extrapolating the details although I have no doubt that is the case for some. The wealth of newspaper articles available provide a very mixed bag of information - some could very well be 100% accurate, some could be 100% wrong and the treasure hunter must sort it out.

I know that Harold O. Weight had decided that the original Breyfogle to discover the ledge was named Charles C. and there is some documentation to support that contention. Even the Breyfogle that published a family history study agreed with Weight's conclusions. However that Breyfogle included other information that points to a different name - a match for the version of the tale we have (posted earlier) http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/t...2-lost-breyfogle-gold-mine-4.html#post6417199 Louis Jacob Breyfogle. An extract from the letter cited, quote

"In regard to the name of Mr. Breyfogle, the old miner, I think it was Louis Jacob, but could not be positive, it is so long
since my father told me about him. My father, William 0. Breyfogle, and this cousin came across the plains from Ohio
together with an ox-train in the early fifties. They landed in Portland, Oregon, and walked to San Francisco. In a few years my father went into the lumber business. His cousin got the gold fever and my father staked him. In 1864, he found this mine in Death Valley. He brought back a large specimen of solid gold. Father told me it weighed eighteen
ounces.

"I was born in San Francisco, July sixth, 1868, and Mother told me of her giving him money to go on his last journey, in 1868,
after my birth. He returned to Salt Lake City, and took a crew of men and started out with them, equipped to develop the mine. After getting into the Valley they lost their bearings, and his crew deserted him, but he continued on for several days and finally found the spring which gave him his bearings, and he found the mine again. He returned to the spring to camp for the night. He was surrounded by Indians and was shot by them with a poisoned arrow.

"The Indians disappeared, leaving him to die. After they had gone, he managed to get on his mule and started back to Salt
Lake City. A few days after he got back to Salt Lake he died of blood poisoning. Though he had the best of medical treat¬
ment, it was of no avail.

"He left a map of the claim with my Father, so Father could carry on in case anything should happen to him. Father let
another cousin have the map as they were going to try to relocate the claim, but he died and after his death we could
not find the map.

"This is a brief outline of the facts as my Father told me and are the true facts as told me by both my Father and my Mother. "

end quote from letter of William R, Breyfogle (born 1868 and now deceased) to Dane Coolidge, author of "Death Valley Prospectors", and published in his book.

A Louis Breyfogle is listed as the brother of Israel Breyfogle Jr, of Ohio in the 1850 US census, sons of Israel Breyfogle whom was born in PA in 1809, the family being of Pennsylvania Dutch origins (German). Israel (Sr) traveled to California in the 1849 gold rush, along with about five other Breyfogle family members including Joshua, Israel Jr, and Charles C. This is a key point to remember later.

From the History of Johnson County Kansas by Ed Blair, pages 444-445

So Israel Breyfogle Sr went to California in the 49er gold rush and returned to Kansas with several thousand dollars, a tidy sum for that time! Now remember that newspaper article which stated Breyfogle sold fifty pounds of his ore for $6000? Interesting no? Could the original Breyfogle have been Israel Sr?

Anyway there is much more to this, more than one Breyfogle was tramping around Death Valley and Nevada hunting for the lost ledge. People who encountered Lewis might report the story in the newspaper, and another might encounter Israel or John or Jacob and report it to the newspaper, and presto we have several different first names for Breyfogle, and worse, all telling of different areas - which makes perfect sense since at least one version of the story states that it was three (or two in another version) Breyfogle brothers whom had found the ledge. My bet is that this issue - several different Breyfogles tramping the desert over decades - has helped to keep the lost Breyfogle LOST.

Please do continue,

 

[KANACKI]

Hello Oro

Interesting post and yes I think I need that coffee.

You make some excellent points.

In the family history book about the Breyfogle family history by L W Breyfogle. explains below...





So we have two mines Charles C Breyfogle found a gold reef and but never re-discovered it or mined it. Other than some samples he took. Jacob found a mine and mined it to his death then left a map to his distant cousin William O Breyfogle.




Well good point its easy to see the story being confused between two different stories. Let alone being butchered by newspaper editors.


Don'y ya just love treasure legends.

Kanacki

 

[Oroblanco]

The same source (LW Breyfogle) includes the story of his relative Charles Breyfogle*** whom ALSO went to California for gold and returned with some $20,000; at the sight of which Jacob Breyfogle quit his blacksmithing work and trekked off heading west to find his fortune. Hence a link to the versions of the story which have it as Jacob Breyfogle, a supposed blacksmith living in Austin Nevada!

***- note this is Charles Breyfogle and NOT Charles C Breyfogle! Two different Charles Breyfogles both of whom apparently went to the gold country at different times!

So now we have six different Breyfogles in the first trip to the gold country (1849) and three more Breyfogles that went there as well in later years.

More coffee anyone?

 

[Oroblanco]

Here is the relevant part I was referring to in the above post #74

We have heard the story of Charles Breyfogle*s overland journey from
the old Breyfogle farm near Kutztown to Columbus, Ohio when he was about 15
years old. It is a distance of about 475 miles. On present high-speed
highways,' it can be traveled in a day. However, before the railroads were
built, it would require at least 25 days by horse power, and since Charles
walked most of the way, it must have taken much longer. Dr. Edwin Brey¬
fogle said a man in Columbus found him crying in front of his shop and took
him in and gave him a job. At first, Charles followed the trade of a
tailor, but he was naturally able and industrious, and he branched out into
other things at an early age.

He married into the family of Colonel Cloud, who was a well-known mili¬
tary figure of that day, and there were born to the union twelve children.
Charles carried on contracting and other enterprises in Columbus, but the
lure of the discovery of gold in California was too much for him, so that,
in 1849, he went to California by wagon train, and was one of the few to
bring back a fortune, which amounted to $20,000, which would be equivalent
of the buying power of over $100,000 today. We have only an anecdote or
two about his experiences. One is that he returned by a long and hazard¬
ous journey around Cape Horn, South America. The other has been mentioned
before, but it will be related again. As Charles journeyed back from the
East Coast to Columbus (there were railroads by this time) he stopped to
see his Pennsylvania relatives. One of these was a first cousin, a huge
black-bearded blacksmith—Jacob Breyfogle, brother of Joshua D., who wrote
the Breyfogle 1849 Diary, and Charles C., who found and lost the famous
California "Lost Breyfogle Mine".

As James C. Breyfogle (born 1896), a grandson of Charles, tells the
story, when Jacob saw the gold that Charles had brought back, he closed his
blacksmith shop and set out for California, saying that if a man could make
all that money out there, he was going there himself. Such an anecdote is
typical of the small amount of information that has come down to us, and
shows what children remember of the conversations of their elders. In
another generation, unless put on paper and filed in a secure place, even
this outline would be lost to future generations.

 

[KANACKI]

Hello Oro

The Coffee is going down nicely.

I suspect some of the claims of the Breyfogles families of a lost reef and mine was centered on the area around near the Bull Frog Mine? The geological evidence support this. Most of mines in Death Valley in itself was Borax and calcite.

There is at present a developing redevelopment of the Bullfrog Gold Project, Nevada

The Bullfrog Gold Project is located in the prolific Walker Trend about 120 miles NW of Las Vegas, Nevada and has excellent infrastructure. Barrick Gold Corp. produced 2.1 million ounces of gold during the 1990’s from the main Bullfrog open pit, the northern one third of which is now controlled by the Company. The Company’s lands also include the entire Montgomery-Shoshone (M-S) deposit, from which Barrick produced an additional 220,000 ounces of gold. The M-S area also produced 70,000 ounces averaging 0.47 gold ounce per ton from underground mining operations in the early 1900’s.

In October 2014 the Company executed an option to purchase 12 strategic patented claims located adjacent to the Company’s lands and that include the north-east half of the M-S open pit mine. In March 2015 the Company exercised a lease/option to purchase 6 patented claims, 20 unpatented claims and 8 mill site claims from Barrick Bullfrog Inc. The Company also acquired other lands and now controls 5,250 acres of mineral rights in the Bullfrog mine area.

In the map below you can see the drilling sites for taking core samples on their leases.



you can see new exploitation around the mining district.

The following table below shows the drill holes, nick named truth holes where sample can be assayed for amount of AU per Ton.



The following map of the mining district is the most prolific gold bearing area near Death valley. You can see the AU gold values per ton.



Here is two pictures of the site below. What looked in the beginning of the last century and what it looked by the end of the century.



Its not impossible that a gold reef outcrop was discovered by one or perhaps even two family members of Breyfogle family.

So claims of that mining district being the site of the alleged Breyfogle gold reef is very plausible.

However as said the exact location I doubt will be ever be proven and always open to conjecture.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

The gold in this region is pushed up through epithermal vents concentrating along the geological faulting. The red line are high concentrations of gold in the faults. You can see this geological overlay over the top of historical mines below.



While historical lost mines are interesting but we must remember most easy to access gold ledges have been picked clean over 170 odd year.s. They might not even be economical enough to mine these days.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

It should be noted the Keane wonder mine now in the borders of the national park is also part to the west of the above mining area.

It could be quite possible that this mining area as others have suggested was the source of lost gold mine stories connected to Breyfogale?

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

The Bullfrog Gold Project it seems wants to build case for extension of the two open cuts, One in their Montgomery Shoeshone Open cut..



Also for their southern pit West Bonanza Mountain Open cut.



The areas in Green are potential expansion of those workings. However further explorations have been along their and recently acquired tenements. As of 2020 I do not know if they was ever approved of funding and expansion by the mines department?

Kanacki

 

[BillA]

Hi Kanacki

do you have their e-mails also ?
you do have a ton of stuff