A prospector pans beach sand along the coast of what soon will turn into the boom town of Nome. When gold was first discovered along the shore here in 1899 it was so plentiful that simple panning was the best method for concentrating gold.
A 100 years later, underwater miner Zeke Tenhoff has set up his summer yurt home along this same stretch of Nome beach.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
Within months, a tent city grew up around the gold deposits as thousands flocked north to reap the bounty. By 1900, when this photograph was taken, the population had exploded to over 20,000 with many of the new miners coming from the already overcrowded Klondike gold fields.
WATCH VIDEO: Nome's Gold History.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
Miners with simple shakers and box sluices work the beaches that are still yielding good gold. One of the biggest challenges now was hanging on to beach claims since tides and storms made boundaries almost meaningless. One miner of the time remembered that on sunny days, miners crowded the coast almost elbow to elbow for thousands of yards in both directions.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
As the easily-mined beach gold dried up, more sophisticated operations were set up a little further inland like this one at Anvil Creek. These near shore sites were often very productive although miners going much further inland eventually ran into the challenge of permafrost - just like the Hoffman crew discovered at Quartz Creek in the Klondike.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
These three monster nuggets from Anvil Creek were record setters back in 1904. Together they totaled a whopping 387 ounces worth $7200 in 1904 dollars. Today they're worth over $650,000.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
Within a few years more permanent wooden structures were built all across Nome as the town's population continued to expand. By 1905, there were schools, churches, several newspapers and electrical lighting. A hothouse also produced fresh vegetables.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
Gold wealth spawned hundreds of other businesses like Mrs. Lowe's Laundry seen here. If you look closely at what's hanging on the lines, it appears that washing underwear and shirts provided a steady income - that and a little fortune-telling for often superstitious miners.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
In the early days of Nome's expansion, one form of transport used sled-trained dog teams often supplied by the area's large native American population. Short rail lines like the type seen connected larger interior mines with the coast.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
With no port and very shallow coastal waters, Nome had to rely on other means to get passengers and cargo from ship to shore. Here passengers are brought in suspended from a tramway that stretched out to deeper waters 1400 feet offshore.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
This stack of gold bars worth over $1,200,000 was just a part of the gold purchased by Miners and Merchants Bank of Nome, Alaska during the 1905 and 1906 seasons. But by 1909, Nome's great gold rush was largely over as the more easily-mined gold had been cleaned out. The decade-long run yielded as much as 3 million ounces, creating many fortunes, large and small, for thousands who braved the journey to the far north.
Image Credit: DCL Michael Maslan Historic Photographs/CORB
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