Some of the info I post may have been mentioned on other threads before but I think I will include some on this thread.
Between 1896 and 1897 there were 4 gold dredges on the north saskatchewan river between Fort Saskatchewan and Big Island by Devon. And about 30 other full time gold sluicers. The gold take reported for those two seasons was 7500 ounces or 514 pounds. There was probably some gold that wasn't accounted for.
sidenote: John Walter ran a very prosperous lumber mill, coal mine, boat building venture and ferry operation where the Kinsmen field house now is in Edmonton. He moved there in 1875. His house is now a historical tour, free, on weekends.
Anyways, John Walter's wife only dealt in gold dust. She always paid with gold dust for whatever she needed. So she was attaining gold dust from free miners or she was running a sluice long before the dredges of the late 1890's.
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This country was started by voyagers whose young lives were swept away by the currents of the rivers for ten cents a day... just for the vanity of the European's beaver hats. ~ Red Bullets
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It is when you walk alone in nature that you discover your strengths and weaknesses. ~ Red Bullets
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