Teaching Trunks
California’s Gold Rush

What was it like to live during the California Gold Rush? This Teaching Trunk provides the answers as it gives students the opportunity to handle artifacts from the time period. Students can learn how miners would pan for gold with actual tools and gold pans, as well as experience daily life with objects used by miners and their families. Newspaper advertisements, letters, and diary entries of the day are great primary sources and are an excellent way to engage students in critical thinking. This Teaching Trunk gives a true feel for the conditions and hardships of the Gold Rush, a crucial era of California’s history and the beginning of a massive wave of settlement.

Inventory

Educator's Notebook
With background information, CD-ROM, artifact descriptions, and related articles

Books

• The Wells Fargo Book of the Gold Rush by Margaret Rau
• Gold Fever: An American Icon, Close-up Guide by Oakland Museum of California
• Gold Fever! Tales from the California Gold Rush by Rosalyn Schanzer
• Gold Fever by Verla Kay
• Seeds of Hope by Kristiana Gregory (Dear America Series)
• California Gold Rush Cooking by Lisa Golden Shroeder

Historic Photo Posters

• Chinese Labor Auburn, CA, 1851
• The Miner's Ten Commandments, 1853
• Placer Mining near Spanish Flat, CA, 1852
• Woman at Mining Site Auburn, CA, 1852

Videotapes

• The Gold Rush narrated by John Lithgow (1 hour)
• Life in A Gold-Mining Camp 1850 (18 minutes)

Primary Source Materials

• Letters
• Diary Entries
• General Store Advertisement
• Real Estate Advertisements
• Photos
• Illustrations
• Maps

Costumes

• Man's Pants
• Man's Scarf
• Man's Shirt
• Man's Suspenders
• Woman's Apron
• Woman's Blouse
• Woman's Camisole
• Woman's Camp Skirt
• Pantaloons Bloomers
• Woman's Accessories

Artifacts

• Enamelware Cup
• Flat Iron
• Gold Miner's Pan
• Graniteware Wash Pan
• Haversack (bag)
• Lye Soap
• Mucket (cooking pot)
• Powder Horn
• Tin Plate
• Wash Board
• "Fool's Gold" - iron pyrite
• Miner's Knife and Fork
• Possible Bag, Placer Gold and Sinew Thread