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Underground History: African Americans In Gold Rush

California Humanities

Not only is one of the main streets in Yreka called Miner Street, there's a statue of a miner at the entrance to downtown.

The California gold rush brought people from all over the world. And not just white people. It's a little-remarked facet of local history that African-American miners did some of the work digging riches out of creek beds.

Mark Oliver has researched the period extensively and written about it. He's our guest in this month's edition of Underground History, our regular project with the Southern Oregon University Laboratory of Anthropology.

Chelsea Rose from SOULA returns for the discussion.

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The Jefferson Exchange is Jefferson Public Radio's daily talk show focused on news and interests across our region of Southern Oregon and Northern California. Angela Decker is the senior producer, Charlie Zimmermann is the assistant producer, and Geoffrey Riley hosts the show.