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NPTC Southeast Convention Road Trip➤
My friend Patty and I travelled to Asheville, North Carolina for the 2023 National Park Travelers Club Convention. The convention rotates to a different region each year. For 2023, it was in the Southeast region. On the way down, during the convention and on the way home we visited nine National Park Service units and some other parks. On the second day of our road trip we visited Reed Gold Mine State Historic Site.
Reed Gold Mine State Historic Site ➤
John Reed, born in 1759 to a poor family in Germany, joined the local militia in 1777 due to bleak prospects. His unit went to the British army for the American Revolution and transferred to Savannah, Georgia. Deserting in June 1782, he settled in an area with many German speakers, marrying Sarah Kaiser and having seven children. In 1799, their twelve-year-old son Conrad made a discovery that altered their family’s fate.
In 1799, young Conrad discovered a 17-pound gold nugget while skipping church to fish with his siblings. Intrigued by the shiny rock, Conrad showed it to his father, John, who, also curious, took it to a Concord silversmith for identification. The silversmith, unable to recognize it as gold due to its size and lack of gold discoveries in the area at the time, sent John away disappointed. John kept the rock as a doorstop until 1802 when he took it to a jeweler in Fayetteville. That jeweler correctly identified it as gold. John sold it for about $3.50, unaware of its true value of approximately $3600.
Shortly after, John formed a mining partnership with three of his neighbors to dig in the creek. Each partner supplied themselves three enslaved men and a horse in the first year of work. In 1803, they made the first authenticated discovery of gold in the United States. The nugget weighed 28 pounds and still holds the record for largest found East of the Mississippi.
The mine changed ownership many times through the years. Operations moved from placer mining to load mining. Placer mining sifts precious metals out of streambed deposits. Load mining follows a vein of quartz that contains gold underground.
Before 1853, the Reed Mine yielded an estimated $10 million worth of gold. Mining operations at Reed gradually declined after the Civil War until it closed in 1912. Today it is a State Historic Site and a National Historic Landmark. Patty and I watched the movie in the visitors center and took the self-guided walking tour of the grounds and underground tunnels.
Southeast Convention Posts➤
- Booker T Washington National Monument
- Guilford Courthouse National Military Park
- Reed Gold Mine State Historic Site
- Museum of the Cherokee Indian
- Great Smoky: Oconaluftee River Trail
- Great Smoky: Mountain Farm Museum
- Blue Ridge Parkway: Waterrock Knob
- Kings Mountain National Military Park
- Cowpens National Battlefield
- Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site
- Overmountain Victory National Historic Trail
- Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Historical Park
- Antietam National Battlefield
Location: 9621 Reed Mine Rd, Midland, NC
Designation: State Historic Site
Date designated/established: April 1977
Date of my visit: August 2, 2023
Thank you for another great story from the National Park Service. We’ll have to add to our North Carolina bucket list. Good pictures and good writing too.
Great and interesting post. I’m sorry that we didn’t see this when we were in Ashville, but I guess I was focused on breweries in what is labeled as “Beer town USA!