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WPA L. C. PROJECT
Form -3
Place of origin
Project worker
Project editor
j UNIT
Collection (or Type)
Remarks
Form A Federal Writers' Project
Circulvtances of Interview Works Progress Administration
‘Y
Name of worker
Address
Subject
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
William C. Haight
Date January 23, 1939
1225 S. W. Alder Street? Portland, Oregon..
Gold Mining Lore.
Name and address of informant
Carl Hentz, Fizzle No. 13, Little Canyon Mountain,
Canyon City, Oremn.
Date and time of interview January. 19, 1939, 1:00.
Place of interview 1225,S. W. A4der Street, Portland (relative's apartment).
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant
None
Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
None
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
A moderate priced apartment house: one small sitting roam, a Pullman
kitchen, dressing roam and bathroom. A rust -colored davenport and chair, three
wooden chairs, one table, chest of drawers, and a telephone constituted the
furnishings of the rooms.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
W 14861
1. Ancestry
2. Place and date of birth
3. Family
4. Places lived in, with dates 9.
5. Education, with dates 10.
Form B Federal Writers' Project
Personal History of Informant Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLIURE STUDIES
Name of worker
Address
Subject
William C. Haight Date January 19, 1939
1225 S. IL Alder Street, Portland, Oregon
Gold Mining Lore.
Name and address of informant Carl Hentz, Fizzle No. 13, Little Cimpon Mountain.
Canyon City. Oregon.
Information obtained should supply the following facts:
6. Occupations and accomplishments with dates
7. Special skills and interests
8. Community and religious activities
Description of informant
Other points gained in interview
1. German.
2. City of Doern, Province Vespreusin, January 22, 1877.
3. Refused to say.
4. Lived in Doom, Germany, until 1904. Immigrant to America. Since then has lived
in Minnesota and Oregon. Does not remember dates.
5. No formal education.
6. Bricklayer, thasher, and miner. No accomplishments.
7. No special skills or interests other than visiting relatives.
8. None.
9. Mr. Hentz is approximately five feet, ten inches tall. His physiognomy is typically
German. Clear, alert, blue eyes look through astonishing overhanging, shaggy eye-
brows. His features have few wrinkles. Physically he is solid built, and looks
unusually strong for a man of his age.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
Form B Hentz 2.
10. Mr. Hentz said that all he knows about anything is in his head. No books
put it in.
Form C Federal Writers' Project
Text of Interview (Unedited) Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker William C. Haight Date January 23* 1939
Address 1225 S. W. Alder, Portland, Oregon.
Subject Gold Mining Lore
Name and address of informant Carl Rentz., Fizzle No. 13. Little Canyon,
Mountain, Canyon City, Oregon.
Text:
I was born in Germany. The earliest memory I have is walking beside my
father out in the woods looking for trees to fell. As soon as we were able to aid
father he put us to work.
My father was a wagon -maker. To obtain the material necessary forthe
construction of these wagons he had to out his awn trees. Early in the morning we
would arise and tramp out in the moods to look for trees suitable for his use.
When we found one that fulfilled all needs we would saw, trim and cut
those damn trees till the blisters would stick out all over us. After getting the
trees in shape we would pull them to father's shop.
There dad would season the wood, then prepare it for making wagons. His
craft was an ancient one handed down from generation to generation. Perhaps father
entertained the hope some of we children would follow in his footsteps, but none of
us ever did.
My father was a stern disciplinarian. In those days kids were not coddled.
We were here to work and nothing else. As an example of his sternness, at fifteen
he sent me to work for a brickmaker. I don't know what I earned there because my
father always collected the wages and kept them.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Form C Hentz 2.
I worked in the brickmaker's yard until carrying the heavy hod broke
my health down. Even then my father felt that I was probably faking it because I
did not like the work. However, my obvious physical appearance soon became evident
to him.
About that time one of my sisters had came to America and she wanted me
to come and live with her. Once I started to go, but I received a letter from her
telling me that America was suffering from a severe depression and I had better
stay in Germany. This depression was during Cleveland's administration.
Finally, I made the grade and came to America. I settled in Minnesota on
a ranch near my sister. We enjoyed muchly exchanging bits of information on the old
country for news of my new land.
The first year I was here I lived with some German farmers and did not learn
to speak English. The second year I worked for another German but he had some older
children that spoke English. I helped them improve their German and they helped me
to learn English.
Since then I have spoken only in English, though I write all my letters
in German. Probably this is true because I don't know anyone here in America worth
writing to.
I came out west to mine. It seemed to me that the best money could be made
in mines in Oregon. I have been here in Oregon looking for my bucket of gold for
quite a spell.
You know, every miner feels that the next day will bring the answer to
all of his prayers. You learn to be optimistic when you are mining. You have to
be. Hell, a pessimist for a miner is unheard of. At least, I have never met such
a critter.
My home is on part of the location grounds of Fizzle No. 13, a mine located
near the foot of Little Canyon Mountain in Eastern Oregon. The house is about a mile
from a group of shacks that hover around a larger house on the side of Canyon Mountain.
Form C Hentz 3.
The group of miners on Little Canyon call this cluster of shacks, Gukor-
ville. The name comes from the fellow that lives in the largest house, Ike Gukor.
Ike is Mayor of Gukorville, and Dean of the Mountain. He is as much a part of the
diggings in that part as the ore we muck out.
In the evenings we grubbers, pocket hunters, hard -rockers, and placer
miners hunch around the stove in Ike's house and do the best part of our mining.
Say, we have panned out more millions in gold than there is in the whole durn
mountain, while sitting around that stove.
The usual group around that stove includes Ike the mayor; the old man
of the mountain, mother fellow there that looks like one of them Snow Wilite dwarfs
only dirtier; Pete, a half-breed Injun; and a couple of other fellows and myself.
Once in a while we go to town and drink a few beers with the boys. It
kinda depends on the amount of the weekly clean-up or pannings. None of us ever drink
too much. You know you can't rassle with a lever of God's (shovel) all week and
then be drinking your head off.
We usually hit for the hay about nine o'clock in the evening. If there
is anything exciting going on, we stay and listen to the news broadcast at ten
o'clock in the night. Them damn radios is really wonderful. Sure beats every-
thing haw you can hear people a long ways off. Say, I heard Hitler speak not so
long ago. Odd, you know my sister that still lives in Germany told me she was
listening to Hitler on the same day I was. Just think of it. She was sitting in
her home in Germany and I was sitting in Ike's cabin up on little Canyon Mountain,
and we heard the same speech. I heard the Pope one day too. It sure beats all.
Hitler is all right. My sister tells me that she is pleased with him.
Everyone there has a job. In Germany that means something. Personally, I am
grateful for the right to be an American citizen.
I am glad, young fellow, that you want to talk to me about mining. I
would rather talk about the gold I am going to strike than anything else.
Form C Heritz 4.
You're a greenhorn and that makes it all the better. I can tell you
all about it and you can't interrupt me. The main thing is that gold is where
you find it. To find gold you dig, dig, dig, and dig, and then most likely don't
find any.
Recently, I located a quartz mine. That's a gold mine, but the gold is
found in quartz rock. The quartz leader ---the rock that leads you to the mine is
usually found down quite a ways from the mine.
The rock rolls down the hill. Then you find the leader and start the hunt
for the mother lode. I cross cut the hill. You know rock will normally roll in a
fairly straight line. To allow for the usual deviation I figure out a straight line
to where I think it might have come. Then I sort of pocket hunt by criss-crossing
the imaginary straight line.
Often the quartz is near the top of the ground. Other times it will be
seven or eight feet under ground.
When you go pocket hunting the procedure is slightly different. Most
people pick out gold -bearing country to do their pocket hunting. Those that don't
are greenhorns. A pocket of gold is just what the words say. It may contain any
amount of gold. Pockets are found, at least it has been my experience in yellow,
rusty ground. This is caused by the iron rusting out. You know iron is the mother
of gold. Iron may rust but gold is everlasting.
I work my theory of pocket hunting as follows:
First I locate some yellow, rusty ground. Then I dig five holes, criss-
crossing the ground. I number each hole with sticks and take out enough samples to
get a fairly accurate analysis of the ground. These samples are mortared up, then
panned. If the panning shows reasonable traces of gold I know from which hole the
trace is coming. After finding the results of my pocket digging I go back to the
holes I have dug, and dig in the hole that produced the heaviest traces of gold.
Form C Hentz 5.
Not long ago I spotted a ledge approximately 330 feet wide, all showing
gold -producing ore. The difficulty of mining this ledge lies in the fact of law
grade ore. A mucker like myself couldn't make his salt and beans mining it. A
large company could make SOEB money out of the ledge.
I've done some placer mining. Not much, though; too hard to get water
where I am located. Placer mining is done by using a hydraulic system to move
the ore and a sluice box to run the stuff through.
Ohl I've done some hand -work, but that won't get you any place further
than salt and beans. By hand -work you move all the dirt by that lever of God's
(shovel) into a small sluice box. The sluice box is just an ordinary trough with
little rills in the bottom of it. You usually screen the muck before you put it
in the sluice box. Anyway, I always do, it saves a lot of extra work.
Drifting mining is used very little in this locality. However, before I
went to work on the Fizzle No. 13, I did a little drifting on Vance Creek. In
drifting you drive a tunnel into a virgin channel. Wheel out all the fine stuff
and wash it out.
The thing I don't like about drifting on Vance Creek is those damn belly
wiggling rattlesnakes. Jimminy Jack they're thicker than flakes in a snowstorm.
I kinda like them in a way through. They're not as cussed as some men I've met.
They will usually rattle anyway before they make things miserable for you. Damn
little devils, I found them in my bed, on my floor; every place you would think
a snake wouldn't be, there those bastards were. Oh welll if it wasn't for the
rattlesnakes we'd probably have something worse. But on the mountain we don't
have any, which pleases me very much. Least I sleep better nights than I used to
on Vance Creek.
One time a friend of mine up on the mountain had rather an odd experience.
He had started a mine on the mountain that always shoved a prospect. However, the
Form C Hentz 6.
prospect was not good enough to keep him there. You know, we miners have to eat.
Just because a piece of ground looks good is no sign it will pay for your salt
and beans. Well, that fellow, quit digging. He decided to try his luck on some
other spot of ground. Try as he would, he could not get the idea out of his head
that the other hole had a pocket. Occasionally he would wander back and half-
heartedly dig around.
He kept this up for several months. By Jimminy Jack, he hit her one day
for 4600. Nice little pocket.
One day my friend Ike dynamited a tunnel he was working. For months he
had been working this property but the gold was not there. In sheer disgust Ike
loaded the tunnel with dynamite and watched her boaml
Boom she did, too. You know Ike always leaves his ground in good shape.
After blowing her sky-high he decided to clean up. While wheeling some dirt in a
wheelbarrow from what was left of the tunnel to the dumping ground, he noticed a
piece of gold. Ike grabbed a shovel full of dirt and panned her. The first panning
showed five dollars. The wheelbarrow load of dirt contained 4300. Ike made a
good cleanup on that job. His life has been filled with many similar experiences.
Fizzle Number 13 is a regular woman. I have never seen anything like her.
She beguiles me, taunts me. Damn her, she will lead me on with little pockets of
410 or 420, then abruptly stop. Fizzle holds something and by Jimminy Jack I am
going to get it.
A fellow, Irishman by the name of Shay, was working with Ike on a piece
of property. The Irishman unable to entertain a placid nature soon convinced Ike
that their mutual piece of property was not large enough to hold both of them.
This fellow Shay was a tenderfoot and a blowhard. He figured he would
give the fellow a lesson in mining. With Ike's face straight he told the Irishman
to work on some other property.
Form C Hentz 7.
This property was most rightly --so we thought --christened "White Elephant".
Shay went in the back end of the tunnel and started to work. There WAS a large rock
not too firmly embedded that worried Shay considerably. To remove this worry and the
rock at the same time he put a shot underneath.
I'll be god damned if he didn't blow himself into a pocket that held
$18,000. It beats all haw these tenderfoots will occasionally whip through with
a winner.
In a little hole that I started on the mountain I got the surprise of my
life. I was about six or eight feet deep and finding nothing. I decided to give
up the spot. When I lifted myself out of the hole I used a pick. The weight of
my body made the dirt give way that the pick had dug into. Several days later I
went back to the hole and just for the hell of it went down in the hole and obtained
a pan of the leavings. The leavings showed a heavy trace of gold. For awhile I
couldn't figure it out. Then it occurred to me that my pick had knocked off the
dirt from the top of the mine.
This conclusion was correct. I dug around the top a little and the
pocket ran to about four hundred dollars. All the fellows kidded me about being
a greenhorn. You see it is the kind of aa experience they usually tell on green-
horns.
By the way, did I tell you haw the Greenhorn Mountains got their name:
A greenhorn came into the small mining town looking for a mine. The boys after
giving him the 'once over' decided he was looking for shade. They told him thatunder
a large tree near the camp would be a good place to start digging. The most
pleasant part of the digging would be all the nice shade he mould have from the
tree.
I'll be damnedI The Greenhorn dug there, went down about seven or eight
feet and he struck it rich.
Form C Hentz 8.
He took the odd -looking stuff that he had found and asked a fellow
in the camp if that wasn't gold. Poor he didn't know gold from
brass. To him rock was rock. Well, the boys told him it was gold. Hell, there
wasn't anything else to do. He sold the mine for $70,000. Can you beat it?
Time for me to go now. Got to head back to Eastern Oregon so I can
go take out a real pocket this time. Fizzle is still flirting with me and this
time I an going to sneak up on her and get the real pocket she is holding.
Form D
Extra Comment
Federal Writers' Project
Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Willin C. Haight ,Date January 19, 3939.
Address 1225 S.W. Alder Street. Portland, Oregon
Subject Gold Mining Lore.
Name and address of informant Carl Hentz, Fizzle No. 15. Little Canyon Mountain,
Canyon City, Oregon.
Comment:
MX. Hentz is a taciturn man. This seems to be a characteristic of most
of the men that live his kind of life. Perhaps they are too busy to talk.
There is little comment to be made, due to the necessary shortness oft he
interview.
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).