7,000 Miners Head for the Skagit, But High Water Halts the Diggings
Spring freshets wash out the wingdams on Ruby Creek while hundreds of men wait at the Portage for a trail and pack animals — and California newspapers predict a stampede of thousands.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
Large numbers of miners bound for the Skagit arrived on the Dakota. At Ruby the weather is very warm and the snow melting rapidly, but the spring freshet has washed away all the wingdams on Ruby Creek, and mining is suspended on account of high water. Capt. Smith, of the Josephine, is confident he can reach the Portage with his boat and will start at an early hour this morning. At the New England Hotel can be seen a quantity of Skagit gold—$74 of it from Ruby and the balance from Granite Creek. The San Francisco Bulletin estimates that as many as 7,000 men will start from California for the Skagit mines during June and July. The Josephine, leaving here Monday, took several horses and pack saddles to Skagit City; the trail from there to the Portage will soon be finished and a pack train started immediately. A returned miner says there are between three and four hundred men at the Portage and Goodell's awaiting the completion of the trail and arrival of pack animals. Mr. L. P. French is at work in the mines, expresses great confidence in the diggings, and will go back in a few days with four months' provisions for himself and partners. Capt. Stretch of the Nellie has found the head of navigation on the Skagit, and as long as the present high water continues he will run to the Portage once a week, leaving Wednesday mornings.
“The spring freshet has washed away all the wingdams on Ruby Creek, and mining is suspended on account of high water.”
The Skagit gold rush of 1880 was a textbook boom: word of a strike sent thousands up the river, only to meet spring floods and an unfinished trail. Today the same upper Skagit River country sits inside North Cascades National Park, its mines reclaimed by forest — but the boom-and-bottleneck pattern of hype, migration and infrastructure lag still runs through Pacific Northwest economy.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.