Pike Bell arrived in Auburn in 1861 , barely 19 yrs old, he joined the rush for California gold fields . . .He first arrived in Placerville, then called "Hangtown". All the mining ground was occupied so he hired out to shovel gravel into another man’s sluice. By noon his back was blistered and he took his ½ ounce of gold and vowed never to work for someone else. He tried the cattle game near Marysville,. . .but gold fever was in his blood. He soon sold out and returned to the Mother Lode in the Sierras. He was a prospector or in the local lingo "Pocket hunter" to the end of his days
. . .. At one time Pike had 200 coolies working for him at Gold Hill near Ophir. .His sluice boxes once, were burdened with dust from Doty’s Ravine, close to the area where tremendous dredges later gouged the earth. At last, in 1861-63 "Pike" decided to begin mining in Auburn.
, , ,Around 1861 on Bald Hill some six or seven miles northeast of Auburn, "Pike" finally made his home, occupying 160 acres of land , , ,No record of a bill of sale has been found to date and it is believed he moved onto it under "preemptive or "posserory rights.
. . .The ranch did not produce much in the way of livestock, but it did produce a fortune in gold..
. . .Not many mining claims were recorded in those days, but there are at least 47 mines of over $100.00 in value ninety percent of which were within five miles of Bald Hill. . . .he built a saloon naming it "Bowles " Saloon and a 90x40 ft dance hall on Bald Hill across the road from his ranch.
The last mine of Pike Bell’s was the Black Oak property some ten miles from home near the Weimar Sanatarium at Weimar. His son, Ed, describes the occasion. " Dad and my older brother Joe, were deer hunting with a party and found a piece of quartz float which led him to a nice looking outcropping . Dad and Joe went back later and developed the mine and it looked pretty good." The Black Oak was the only one of Pike Bell’s mines to have its own stamp mill. When his son . Ed, was asked how his dad (found all of his mines) He said,"Well, he learned mining the hard way. He figured placer gold had to come from somewhere and he mixed a lot of common sense and hard work with finding the source of placer deposits".
On December 19tth, 1895, he died of heart disease at the age of 63 yrs and 7 mos,.
His son.,Ed, recalled "Dad had a deal in 1895 to sell the Black Oak Mine for $60,000, but he did not live to complete the transaction".
In 1909 at age 55, Mary Smith Bell resided on her homestead. atop Bald Hill for 11 yrs following Pike’s death, but never filed for a final land patent . She was a widow and her children were grown and working in the area. Lester, ("Jeff)") , Benjamin, Joseph, Alma, Edward and Mary.
Mary signed an agreement with her neighbors W..J. Duryea, Fred Nett, Stephen Arthur, George Griffin, Henry Northcutt and Albert Gounerman to share the South Yuba Water Company’s water ditch running through the Bell land.
(This book tells of Pike’s many other interests which are too many for this article).