Students go for a summer dig in gold mining country

By Nancy Westlund
Herald staff

When four St. Francis Catholic High School students tell their “What I did this summer” stories upon returning to school this fall, they’re likely to receive some second glances and even a bit of interrogation.

The Sacramento high school students spent three weeks in June excavating, mapping and surveying a gold miner’s site along the banks of Auburn Ravine near Lincoln.

Wendy Jorae, the St. Francis teacher who taught the archeology class for the first time this summer, said that the experience was an exciting way to make history come alive.

“To know you’re actually standing on the spot where somebody from the past lived, that you’re holding the things they held in their hands or made themselves is amazing to me,” she said. “We’re recreating history.”

Jorae said the idea of creating an introductory archeology class for her students was actually born at California State University Sacramento while she was working on an archeology project toward her master’s degree. Project site work included excavating two Chinese cemeteries at Virginia Town, an 1850s gold mining community near Lincoln, a second nearby mining town, Gold Hill, and neighboring Auburn Ravine.

Upon discovering the Auburn Ravine property was owned by Joe Johnson, professor of archeology at CSUS, Jorae asked permission to open the site up to St. Francis students.

“We’re both interested in making archeology more available to the public,” she said.

The elective archeology class was offered to students in grades nine through 12. It involved students working at the Auburn Ravine site three days a week and returning to complete laboratory work at the CSUS campus. The high school students were accompanied by professional archeologists at both locations.

Jennifer Smith, a senior at St. Francis, said she signed up for the archeology class because Jorae is, in her words, “a great teacher who makes everything fun.”

On her first day at the “dig,” armed with a trowel, Smith realized the thrill of discovering artifacts and literally peeling away layers of time.

“Different layers of dirt provided us with information,” she said. “There were pieces of pottery as well as ash, showing a fire had been built for cooking. It was amazing to think about.”

Jorae said that professional archeologists who had explored the site knew the area had been inhabited by Chinese miners during the Gold Rush, and excavations further revealed other civilizations had also inhabited Auburn Ravine.

“The site had more than Chinese artifacts. We found a Native American presence, and evidence of people living here 1500 years ago,” said Jorae. “Much to our surprise we found artifacts like sewing items showing that a woman homesteaded here.”

For Daron LaFranchi, who will be among incoming freshmen at St. Francis this fall, uncovering mysteries of past civilizations is something she has wanted to do since her childhood. While coming across Maidu artifacts and chunks of rock that dated back to prehistoric time was fascinating, it was lab time that was the true adventure.

“I really did enjoy getting up close with the stuff you were digging,” LaFranchi said. “You clean it and think, wow, this is really cool.”

For more information on the summer archeology class, visit the Web site: www.Jorae.freewebspace.com.

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