The toxic myth of the Gold Rush
One doesn’t have to visit bucolic Gold Rush towns like Coloma, where you can give panning for gold a try, to see the truth. Before 1975, there was no state or federal law mandating cleanup of mining operations. Today, California’s Department of Conservation estimates that there are at least 47,000 abandoned mines dotted across almost every county in the state. … And about 5,000 of these mines, according to state estimates, are also likely contaminated — leaching out harmful heavy metals like arsenic, lead, and mercury that were dug up from deep underground or added to the environment in a desperate attempt to extract every nugget of gold.