Jarbidge is located in northeastern Nevada, just below the Idaho border. The region has rich mineral resources, and mining has been an important industry in the region for over a century. Jarbidge is a remote mining camp, and any visitors to the area should go prepared. Services are limited.
Gold Discovery at Jarbidge
In the late 1900s, gold was discovered in the Jarbidge Mountains, leading to a small mining boom in the area. Several mines were established, and the town of Jarbidge grew rapidly as miners and prospectors flocked to the area in search of gold.
The town was mostly a tent camp. During the first years at Jarbidge, over 500 tents stretched through a small canyon for miles along the Jarbidge River.
Northern Nevada is a rich gold mining region. The strikes at Jarbidge were some of the most remote in the state. While about $10 million in gold was extracted from the Jarbidge Mountains, most mines in the area now lay dormant.
Boom & Bust
The mining activity peaked in 1910. As with many mining towns throughout the West, the richness of the initial discoveries were widely exaggerated. What started with a rush of perhaps 1500 men dwindled to just a few hundred within a year.
Tents would eventually be replaced with wood buildings. Less men remained, but there were still decent gold deposits to work, and the remoteness of the area held potential for other potential deposits yet to be found.
New Strike and Renewed Interest
It took almost a decade for the richest ore deposits to be discovered in Jarbidge. In 1918, the Elkoro Mining Company set up a mill to process ore. The mine workings were extensive and the population of Jarbidge grew once more.
While the mining activity declined in the later years, there have been intermittent mining operations in the area since then, primarily focused on gold and silver extraction. Some small-scale mining and prospecting activities continue to take place in the Jarbidge region.
Amusing Story: Many years ago, I was prospecting for gold in the remote desert region near the headwaters of the Bruneau River, perhaps 10-20 miles west of Jarbidge. I was on a 4-wheeler, WAY off the beaten path and many miles from the nearest paved road.
As I round the bend on a dirt road, I see a parked car, like a Toyota or Honda, with guy frantically waving at me to slow down. He had trusted his GPS Navigation system, and he decided to take a “shortcut” from Bruneau, Idaho to Jackpot, Nevada. Rather than taking him on the well-traveled highway, his GPS told him to cut across 50 miles of rough dirt roads, across the Owyhee desert and over the Jarbidge Mountains.
Needless to say, you shouldn’t always trust what your GPS tells you to do.
A map showing Nevada’s richest gold and silver mining camps.