The daily star-mirror. (Moscow, Idaho) 1911-1939, 1922-08-18
RUSH FOR COLD
BRINGS MANY
0atman, Ariz., Is Much Like a
Temporary War Town.
Ex-SOLD|ERS FLOCK TO PLACE.

Take to Diamond Drilling With a,
Much Facility as They Did to Pump
ing Machine Gun in France
Many of the Veterans Are Prospect
ing on Their Own-PIan, When The,
Make Their Pile, to Reclaim Lant
In Boulder Dam Country.
Every generation has it's gold rush
In 40 they came to Sacramento. In
| the SOS and sos to Leadville and
Cripple Greek. In 1896 to 1900 fortune
hunters swarmed to the Klondike. In
TOnOpah and other nearby mining
! centers was at its height.
| The latest gold rush is at Oatman,
Ariz., where gold ore running $4,000
to the ton was recently opened up.
Hundreds of ex-soldiers, who have
found it necessary to come to a dry
climate as a result of having been
gassed in the war, are fiocking into
Oatman, where the American Legion
Is caring for them and doing what 1t
can tc secure them employment at
are going forward here to build a
big hospital for disabled soldiers high
Up in the gold-bearing mountains. The
location of this hospital already has
been taken up with Governor Thomas
II. Campbell of Arizona, who will soon
visit Oatman to discuss the hospital
project.
Just now Oatman has a familiar
aspect to these ex-soldiers, for it re-
sembles a town on the western front.
Dynamite detonations keep the ground
in constant tremble and the all
night-long booming and blasting be-
low ground sound familiar in an old
soldiers ears.
Like Temporary War Place.
The town itself resembles a tempo
rary war town. Ypres now has its
makeshift wooden hotels, its shacks
made of gasoline tins and stray field
"Over there" they are still blowing
up piles Of stray shells, while here,
below ground, they are dynamiting
down gold ore with which to aid the
work of reconstruction in Europe
Uncle Sam made a special request
that the gold mines of Oatman be
kept going during the war-and Dat
man went over the top in 100 per cent
1t mined gold when labor
.osts and taxes made it losing game.
But now the soldiers have returned !
md in the big after-war hegira of |
Dung America westward the Oatman |
gold fields are getting their share of |
ads who served overseas.
These eX-soldiers take to diamond |
lrilling with as much facility as they ,
i'd to pumping q machine gun up |
round MOntfaucOn. And they handle (
he dangerous decorating caps used
8 much freedom as they touched of
and-made grenades in the trenches.
Many Veterans Prospecting.
Many of the veterans are prospect
lg on their own. They come to Oat-
ian in flivvers, remove their engines
nd attach them to diamond drills
hich they have either rented or pur
lased, and with a 'rat-a-tat-tat" not
Mike the rattle of machine gun,
icy sink their diamond studded drills
ito the earth in the search for gold
caring quartz vein Several of the
DIS have hit it rich, some are ION
leir uppers,' but all are having a
BOD time
Many of them plan to make their
lie in Oatman and then go up to the
,untry below the gigantic national
I'M which is to be built by the gov
in Boulder Canyon. One col
~ of ex-soldiers plans to lay out
ousands Of acres which is now the
iding place of cactus, rattIesnakes
ID barren soil, but which. when the
,ulder Canyon dam is opened, will
one OF the richest districts in the
uthwest. This land already is rising
value in anticipation of its in
eased worth when irrigation bitches
IL be running through If