There is gold in them thar hills

Follow the Klamath River out of Oregon around 100 miles into the north-western part of California and you will eventually come to Happy Camp. Be sure to take a dramamine or two because the river road is VERY wind-y. I put a hyphen to make sure you didn't think I wrote that the road was very windy (moving air). So, is the spelling the same for a road that has lots of turns and bends (windy) or is there a unique spelling for it? I tried Windey and Windee and neither spell checks in Word so would someone please tell me. Fun with an F and Phone with a Ph. I see why people say English is one of the harder languages to learn. Unless of course you go to Ken-tuck-ee where I served my mission and everthing is pronownced and speld just as it sounds.

Anyway, back to Happy Camp. If you type "Happy Camp California" into google earth you will get a glimpse of where I grew up. You will notice a larger river (Klamath running from right to left and a smaller tributary (Indian creek) coming from the top of the screen and dumping into the Klamath. Where the two intersect sat our elementary school. One half of a mile up Indian creek sat my parents home. If you look closely there is a bend in the road alongside Indian creek that turns the road back toward the creek and then just before the creek it bends to again run alongside the creek. My home was at the corner of the 2nd bend or literally right on the creek. It is rather easy to see the home. It has a blue roof. For my sisters this will be fun to do if they haven't already done so. Many memories will be brought back as you scroll around town from above.

Having a home that sat right on a crystal clear mountain creek was a great benefit for a young kid! I remember jade (a beautiful green stone) was easy to find and in plenty along the banks of the creek. We used to skip them on the water and never gathered them to save. I am told that eventually an outsider discovered this fact and rock hounds flocked to the area and stripped it of the natural supply. I wish I had realized what it was and saved some. Anyway, as my sister KJ mentioned in a comment we had some great times on the creek. There were some great swimming holes just up from our house where we literally lived during the summer. We would jump off the side of the mountain into the water. We would also sit on our rears with our feet elevated to allow us to run the rapids. As KJ mentioned, we were allowed to do so from a very young age. We lived on the creek. The water was so pure and clear that many of my memories are tied to that very fact! There is something magical about crystal clear mountain water that allows you to clearly see to the bottom of a 12' deep hole. You can see the rocks clearly on the bottom and can even see an occassional trout or steelhead swimming by. Speaking of which, every year the salmon would come up creek to spawn. We would literally see them begin to come in off from the deck of our home. The next weeks were a very fun time for a teenage boy with a baseball bat or gig (devil like pitch fork with prongs). Catching salmon was great part of my childhood! I enjoyed "snagging" them. We would use a large treble hook and wrap red or white cloth around the barbs so you could easily see it. For weight you would place a sinkder just above the eye of the hook. To be successful you would cast the hook beyond and upstream from the salmon. Then, you would jiggle and pull the hook until you positioned it just beyond the fish a few feet until it was just in front of it's head. The fish would many times swim away but sometimes would come right back to the same spot and settle in. Once it did you braced yourself and prepared your sneakers for a race upstream! With a secure jerk of the pole the hook would find it's home somewhere in the side of the fish. A head snag would be most ideal so you could turn the fish and guide him. A tail snag proved to be a much more exciting and lengthy fight. Now, I want to clearly admit that what I and virtually every boy that grew up in such a town did was wrong! Such things would be much more criticised and regulated today than they were in the 70's. Now days I prefer to fly fish for my catch following all rules. I will admit those were great experiences for a boy and prove to be fun memories!

A story is told that in the gold rush days some miners camped along the river or creek and that night became "happy" around the "camp" fire with a certain beverage. I don't know about the truthfulness of that story but I can attest for the gold. Talk about an exciting thing for a boy. I remember watching adults pan for gold along the river banks. As I got older "gold fever" hit and outsiders and locals purchased dredges and hunted for gold. The concept was that gold being heavier than other aggregates caused the gold to settle into the deeper parts of river beds. The best thing to do was to find a granite or rock river bottom and literally suck out the gravel and rock to the bottom until the rocky bed was cleared of debris. In doing so you would likely find gold. One miner found a nugget the size of a beer can and made all the papers. Basically, a dredge is a pump that sucks the debris through a hose (operated by a diver using a breathing tube from the dredge) and then the debris is washed over a wash board with ribbing. The lighter aggregate would wash right over the ribbing but the heavier materials would settle into the ribbing. Hopefully, when a hard days efforts were spent there would be "color" in the bed. I remember watching my brother use a dredge and finding small pieces of gold. I, myself, panned for gold many times and found "color". The largest piece I probably found was about the size of a BB. But, that was big enough to be VERY exciting. As you dig under tree roots or other places for the perfect pan of material you would then "pan" for gold. The process was simple in concept but took a particular touch. You would swirl the pan in a circular motion while tipping the outer lip downward toward the creek so that lighter materials would "float" in the water that washed around and out of the pan. Eventually, as you do this properly you are left with a very black sandy material. If you were lucky you would find gold flakes or maybe even "klunkers" that stand out easily in the black sand. I found flakes virtually everytime I tried. Occassionally a small "klunker" that you could roll between your fingertips. I very clearly understand what is meant by "gold fever". There is something very magical about the experience. Truth be known I have the goal of going back to Happy Camp to swim in the cool pools of water in Indian Creek and to pan for gold! Who knows, maybe I can even find some jade!

Speaking of gold I am reminded of something that was significant in my childhood. As a boy I was very intrigued by religion and God. When I was in 2nd grade and lived in Greenview I had the opportunity to attend bible school. If you attended every meeting you would earn your very own bible with your name written on the front in "gold"! Wow, to a 7 year old that was a very exciting prize! At least it was to me. I have that very bible on the bookshelf of my desk. Another of my prized possessions. It wasn't but 2 years later that the Mormon missionaries taught my family and my 3 older brothers and I were baptized in Ashland, Oregon at our Stake Center (120 miles away). But, more about that later.