Gilpin Railroad - Gold Extraction

Gold Extraction

The story of the Gilpin Tramway starts in April 1859 when John H. Gregory started up Clear Creek from Golden searching for gold. Gold flakes were being found in the creek, so the question was, where was the gold coming from. Working up the creek and following the north branch of Clear Creek at what is now known as Forks (for years, a station and restaurant, now a traffic light), Gregory found the richest gold dust in what is now called Gregory Gulch above Blackhawk. The Gregory Lode had been found.

The news of gold hit the nation. By September, a population of 900 in log shanties and tents had invaded the valley. By the summer of 1860, sixty ore mills and thirty arastras (a kind of ore grinding pit) were in operation and the population had risen to 15,000. Soon numerous mining camps had sprung up including Black Hawk, Central City, Nevadaville, Russell Gulch and Apex.

But by the mid-1860s, the easy gold had been mined out. Gilpin county came on hard times. What was needed was both better technology in milling, and a means of transporting the ore from mine to mill and mill to the rest of the world. New technology did come, with the first smelter being set up in Black Hawk in 1865. As for transportation, that came in the form of the 3 ft (914 mm) narrow-gauge Colorado Central Railroad (CCRR). The CCRR was formed in 1870 with construction starting in September 1871. Based in Golden, the trackage worked its way up Clear Creek, splitting at Forks with the first branch going on to Black Hawk. The train arrived in Black Hawk on December 15, 1873. The mills now had a way to get their product to Denver and the world beyond. In 1878, a switchback extension was built the one mile (1.6 km) distance from Black Hawk to Central City with four miles (6 km) of trackage, and the first train arriving on May 21, 1878.