$15.00
Gold In The Foothills
by Jerry Brady
This story is the history of an old gold mining town in the foothills of Northern California’s Mother Lode Country, You Bet, California. It tells of some of the prominent characters involved in the interplay of drift and hydraulic mining in the You Bet area. Our story extends from the mighty gold-rush-days of the gallant forty niners, through the great depression of the 1930s and to the advent of the Second World War. Bringing into play the lives and loves of many people, the story narrows down to a gold mine legend and a search for one of the greatest single lodes of placer-gold ever to escape men’s greedy clutches.
A native of You Bet, Jerry Brady attended his first four years of grammar school there and the remainder through grade twelve in Nevada City. Several of his teenage summers were spent in You Bet, either hiking to Chalk Bluff to cut wood on his grandparents’ old homestead or working with his father on the county road.
One of his most memorable times accompanied the gathering of the winter’s wood, when his father would spin many a childhood yarn, and the entire You Bet Mine seemed to come alive with his vivid descriptions of his own youthful adventures.
Jerry Brady now resides in San Pedro, California. As time goes on, his love for his home country burns deeper, and along with intense memories of his own childhood experiences, he hopes to someday rebuild the family’s old You Bet home in its former image, and eventually establishing other historical monuments to preserve the heritage of a great little town deserted, but not forgotten, You Bet.