San Deigo Historic Site 412 JULIAN

The Julian marker is to be found in the Julian Memorial Park, on the right hand sideof Highway 78 as it enters town from the West. The historical museum in the park has been a blacksmith shop, a brewery, a jail, a barn, and a warehouse.

Julian was the greatest gold mining camp in this part of the country. In 1869gold was discovered on Coleman Creek, and its banks were soon lined with men using pans, cradles, and sluice boxes. The following year began with a numberof quartz claims being registered, but the great rush didn't begin until afterH. C. Bickers went out for a solitary Sunday walk on February 20, 1870, and, after following some bear tracks, discovered a rock with free gold in it. Two days later, on Washington's Birthday, the claim was staked and called the George Washington Mine. On March 1st Bickers and his partners sent 1200 pounds of rich ore to San Diego, and the hills were immediately inundated with red-shirted prospectors. During the first month of the rush 260 claims and 40 rich strikes were made. The first stamp mill was soon freighted up from a mine at Escondido. A tradition that Billy Gorman, a thirteen-year-old, foundthe George Washington, while fetching firewood for his mother, is apparently no more than a tradition.

Drury Bailey, a Confederate veteran, who had settled in the area because of its sylvan beauty, founded the town on his homestead claim, and named it for his cousin Mike Julian, because he was the handsomest man in the camp. Rapid growth in population would have made Julian the county seat, had not San Diego partisans plied Julian voters with liquor enough to keep a decisive number away from the polls at an election to determine whether the county seat should be moved.

Thirteen million dollars worth of gold was taken out of Julian mines, and some are still being worked. Cattle raising was an early industry, too, and is now the most important. The section was found to be ideal apple country.Julian apples have been winning international prizes ever since the greatParis World's Fair of 1886, and before. An extensive amount of lumbering was done around Julian. Forests, whose great pines were felled for mine props and San Diego gingerbread houses, are beginning to clothe the hillswith their majesty again.