Hello historik and welcome to the DUSA forums!!!

What a great post! I really enjoyed reading it. Man... If that wasn't on a bombing range, I think I would already be planning a trip to go look the area over.

Since it is... I guess I will stay closer to home and keep chasing after the "Dutchman".

Have you got any stories that apply to the Superstition Mountains?

Best,

Jim

Hi Jim,
The only thing I heard about the LDM is that it could have possibly been part of the Peralta workings.. It's not one of the yarns that I have looked into, I live in SoCal and have concentrated on this area... But I'm always up for a good story...

Thx
Historik

historik,

What part of SoCal are you in?
I went to High School in Whittier in the 60's, and lived in Escondido for a while in the 80's.

Jim

I am currently in Redlands near Riverside......

I will echo Jim in complementing your post,historik.
Very well written and thoughtful analysis that does a good job of whittling the tale down to specific clues.Certainly makes the story more believable in the process.
As for the fact that the area is a former bombing range.Unless it was used for testing live ordinance (real bombs),it is likely that it would be only littered with the remains of practice (dumb) bombs and flash-bang types.Many of these can be quite dangerous if unexploded however,and I would not recommend wandering around out there because of this hazard.Other than the potholes created,mainly at the target areas,very little alteration of the landscape will have occurred as a result of this activity.

Regards:SH.

Thx Somehiker,
The Carrizo Impact Area ( CIA ) was used between 1942 and June 1959, the ordnance consisted of bombs ranging from 3 to 1,000 pounds, rockets, 20-millimeter cartridges and 50-caliber bullets. The Navy actually returned the area back to the park after it initiated a " bomb disposal program ". The Marines removed 333 tons of " dud fired and inert ordnance ", including a convoy of 14 tanker trucks, 3 artillery vehicles and 5 Sherman tanks. The public was allowed back in on Oct 30 1959, but that same year a man was killed trying to remove " scrap metal ". The Navy and the Park argued about who was to be responsible for any " mishaps " if they happen, and on Dec 14, 1962 the park closed the area. Between 1980 and 1993, another 3500 lbs was removed including some 500 pounders, the Navy contends that the area is 90% clean. But with 10% still remaining the park prefers to keep it closed, I have some friends that have been in the area with special permission and it is absolutely beautiful. If you want to know what the desert looked like before 50-60 years of human contact this is the place. I have seen pictures of Red Rock Canyon as well as some other places, and this is by far the most pristine area that the park has to offer. I just wish it was open.....

Historik

Wonder how many black nuggets were gathered up with all the other bits and pieces of MD found metal.Likely that they all wound up in the same scrap bins....shipped to Japan and made into Toyotas.Or Detroit and made into exploding Pintos.

Regards:Wayne

Hello everyone and thank you for your interesting info. This is my first time in any blog. I'm computer and english grammar handycapped so I'll do my best. I read the article by Cactus Jim (I think!) about Mr. "Pegleg" Smith's black gold nuggets and his "lost" mine wich shed a lot of light on a black gold nugget I found in my own yard two months ago.
I detected this gem with my MXT. It showed a 10% target with a +93 VDI at shallow depth. When I first saw it I thought it was a blub of lead covered in hard dirt. I tossed it in my "relic bucket" and forgot all about it. Days later I remember the find so I pulled it out, cleaned it well and inspected it. It was very heavy for its size and looked just like any regular rock, ugly. It was entirely covered by a brown coat of some sort of hard mineralized material (the nugget looks black to the naked eye) as I could see under a powerful loop. It weights 13.6 grams. With a very fine nail file I filed one end of it, expecting to find the typical color of lead but instead there was the typical color of GOLD!!. It was endeed a gold nugget. I knew Gold didn't corrode so I was highly intrigued by the coating of this nugget. After some days of mistery I hit the books but found no info, so I checked the net under "unusual looking nugget" and "black gold nugget" and there was Cactus Jim and his article, Thank you Jim!!!. The Nugget was found in the Mother Load area of Tuolumne county in California and as soon as I know how to "attach" a picture through my computer I'll send you all a picture so you can see it. Now my question is: are these Nuggets rare?, do they command better premiums?... Thank you all for your posts!!.

Depends on what the coating is.

One of the "Pegleg" Nuggets would indeed be valuable. I think though, that the alloyed makeup of Tuolumne Cty gold would not match that of SoCal (Pegleg is supposedly 70% gold, 15% silver, 10% copper, 5% other). The black coating comes from the copper content oxidizing. There have been nuggets found exposed that had a coating of desert varnish, but they aren't Pegleg Nuggets.

Best-Mike

Hi everyone and thank you Gollum for your imput. I thought the same myself, my nugget should not in any way be associated to "Pegleg's" mine. However my question was as to the rarity and value of a "coated" nugget not necesarily "pegleg" nuggets, this are long gone if there ever was one. We don't know to what extent all this stories are true.
With regards the "Pegleg" gold we know absolutely nothing about it. We've never seen one of this nuggets which, so conviniently, have disapeared, nor do we know for sure what was coating them. I don't buy the story of the man who turned two "black gold" nuggets to the news paper in question. Parts of his story are far fetched. I think this guy found "coated" nuggets and turned them in as "pegleg" gold for the glory of it. Or the news paper officials of that time concocted the story to sell more papers, they have never produced these nuggets, NO ONE has seen them.
All we know as a result of Mr. "Pegleg" Smith find is that a different type of Gold nuggets that we never saw exist: Coated nuggets!!. These nuggets have been exposed to different geological processes than most nuggets and should not be exclusively associated with "Pegleg" lost mine, the desert or even desert conditions. Don't fail to consider that that desert was not a desert as little as fifteen thousand years ago (that's just a day in the life of a nugget). This desert was a lush, green forest with animals and plenty of water by then and Mr. "pegleg's" gold had already been formed. Obviously these coated nuggets are very rare and can happen elsewhere than the desert. I ask my self how many miners in other areas have thrown these coated nuggets away because they never knew they where good coated gold nuggets. As long as we keep looking for Mr. Pegleg's nuggets in the desert we'll keep on missing those rare naturaly coated nuggets that few others have ever found, myself included. These are surface, non moving nuggets that can happen anywhere not just "Pegleg's" desert. Now, what the value of one of these is I certainly would like to know.