Title: Great Lompoc Gold Rush

Year: 1998

Master Artist: Roger Cooke, Sandy, OR
Location: This mural has been retired

Description: Lompoc’s “Great Gold Rush” began in 1889 and took place generally from the mouth of the Santa Ynez River to Honda Creek. All claims were taken and over 200 people were working claims by December 1889. But to their dismay, the gold began to disappear in the Spring of 1890.

Many questions remain today: Where did the gold come from? Was there an offshore mother lode that washed ashore and will it come again? Did perhaps, the wreck of the Yankee Blade — in 1854 — reportedly loaded with gold — play a role? Who knows?

Alternate Description:

The Gold Miners that came to California largely bypassed Lompoc in the Gold rush of 1849 because the soils and rivers here showed no ‘color’. But in the late 1880s someone found some gold on the local beach. Within a couple weeks several hundred claims were staked for several miles along the beach. The rush continued for several months and hundreds of pounds of nuggets and dust were recovered from the beach sands. But as quickly as it started the gold stopped coming in, what caused this? Did the shifting currents uncover a vein of gold and then cover it back with sand never to be exposed again? Or was there some lonely traveler from the gold digs to the north who perished in these rough waters and was lost along with his gold which later washed ashore? Will the answer ever be known? It is a mystery of the Lompoc Valley.