Ed and Amy Stamper purchased the company in 1959 from Clara Arnold. At the age of 16, Clara began creating Black Hills Gold jewelry from a business owned by the Butler family in Deadwood. By the 1940s, she owned and operated her own shop on Main Street in Rapid City. Upon retirement in 1959, she continued to share her talents by contributing to the training and development of Stamper employees.
Pure gold is yellow.
The process of alloying is used to achieve the pale pinks and greens depicting our leaves and roses. Alloying not only creates new colors, but also hardens the precious metal for lasting wear. Genuine Black Hills Gold is very labor intensive to produce. Each piece of jewelry is handcrafted by 30 to 40 skilled artisans who are involved in the casting, stamping, grinding, polishing, soldering, cleaning, 24K gold plating, wriggling, engraving and final polishing required to produce a single piece of jewelry. The treatment of the leaves on Black Hills Gold gives the jewelry a distinctive quality.