40 GOLD PLACERS OF RAMPART REGION. 
THE CREEKS AND BENCHES. 
EUREKA CREEK. 
General description. — Eureka Creek, on which gold was first discovered in this area 
(in February, 1899), flows south west ward along the foot of the Baker-Minook divide. 
It runs in a straight southwest course for about 4i miles, then turns and runs south 
2\ miles to its junction with Pioneer Creek. It has a number of small tributaries 
from the northwest side, but none from the southeast. The largest is Boston Creek, 
about 2 miles long, which joins Eureka Creek at its bend. The other tributaries are 
mere rills. Eureka is a small creek carrying barely a sluice head of water above the 
mouth of Boston Creek during the ordinary seasons. From aneroid barometer read- 
ings the gradient of the stream is about 100 feet per mile. The valley slopes gently 
to the divide on the northwest side, but on the southeast side the slope is almost 
precipitous, rising 400 to 600 feet above the valley. The creek flows close to the foot 
of the steeper side. 
The gravels of the creek are not much worn, as is characteristic in weak streams, 
and have been left for a considerable distance, in places at least 500 feet, up the slope 
of the hill as the stream bed has moved to the southeast. The bench gravels, like 
those of the present stream bed, are made up entirely of the country rocks. The 
deposit varies in thickness from 5 to 18 feet, and the overlying muck varies from 
nothing to 8 feet, the distribution being rather irregular. The total thickness varies 
from 5 to 20 feet. The gravel contains a considerable amount of very sticky clay, 
which makes sluicing difficult. The clay seems to come from the decomposition of 
both the arkose and the slates. 
Mining. — Only one claim above and one below the mouth of Boston Creek have so 
far been made to pay, but prospectors on the bench gravels about 2 miles above the 
mouth of Boston Creek reported that they had found gold in sufficient quantities to 
pay for ground sluicing, if not for drifting. On this part of the bench it is 8 feet to 
bed rock near the creek, and 450 or 500 feet back from the stream it is 20 feet. The 
elevation above the creek at this distance, as shown by the aneroid barometer, is 
70 feet, 
The gold is said to be in the lower 18 inches of gravel and in a foot of bed rock. 
Along the creek the bed rock is largely blocky, and in it gold is found to a depth of 
3 feet; but it is not found at such depths where the bed rock decomposes into clay. 
The gold may be distributed through the gravels to a depth of 4 or 5 feet, but it is 
generally close to bed rock, which must be scraped. 
The larger part of the mining has been done by drifting, but on Discovery claim, 
just below the mouth of Boston Creek, an open cut is being worked. The muck and 
upper gravel are ground sluiced through sluice boxes, so as to save any fine gold that 
may be in them, and the lower gravel is shoveled in. Fifty-seven 12-foot boxes are 
used, 37 of which contain pole riffles and 2 contain Hungarian riffles. The lower 
boxes are lined with sheet iron to facilitate the movement of the gravel. Some gold 
is probably carried off by the sticky clay in spite of the length of the sluice box. 
PIONEER (REEK. 
General description. — Pioneer Creek heads against the Baker-Minook divide, flows 
around the head of the Eureka, and then, at a distance of 1 to 2 miles, flows parallel 
to the main course of that creek. After traversing 7 or 8 miles it joins Eureka 
Creek and they are said to lose themselves on Baker Flats. Pioneer Creek is larger 
than Eureka Creek; probably it never carries less than three or four sluice heads of 
water, and its gradient along its lower course is about 60 feet per mile. The valley 
is similar to that of Eureka Creek. Its northwest side is a gentle slope running back 
for about a mile, and the southeast side is of almost precipitous steepness, but nol so 
high. 
