Jose Maria Amador, a wealthy California rancher mined along a nameless creek in 1848 and 1849. His presence gave his surname to the creek, two villages on its banks, and, in 1854, a new county.

 

There was no settlement where Amador City is now until the summer of 1851, after gold outcroppings had been prospected on both sides of "Amadore's Creek", upstream several hundred yards from downtown. The "Original" or "Little" Amador mine and the Spring Hill were probably Amador County's first gold mines.

 

With the discovery of such quartz gold, the settlement that was upstream where the stage road crossed "Amadore's creek" or Amador Crossing, gradually moved to ": South Amadore" or Amador City where French Gulch drains into the creek.

 

The city's most famous and productive mine, the Keystone was organized in 1853 out of two or more claims and before it closed for good in 1942 it produced in intermittent operation about $24 million in gold at much lower gold prices!

 

Amador City was incorporated in 1915 and was the state's smallest such municipality until recent years.

Amador City's oldest building is the main lobby portion of the Amador Hotel, probably built in 1855. The Fleehart or Wells Fargo building is the oldest store in town, dating from the 1860's or earlier.

 

The telephone came to town in 1878, electricity in the mid 1890's and the auto just after the turn of the century.

Reprinted from the Amador City Historic Tour Guide.

 

When the Keystone, original Amador and Bunker Hill gold mines were all operating, Amador City was a bustling community, rivaling Sutter Creek and Jackson. The photo to the right shows the an eight horse team standing ready in front of the Amador Hotel, with the Imperial Hotel to the left. The railroad arrived at Martell in the early 1900s, and freight could be shipped below from Martell.

 

The Fire...

Like most of the towns in gold country, the big fire of 1878 destroyed almost every wood frame business building on main street except for the Fleehart building and the front part of the Amador Hotel. As the owners rebuilt in 1878, they used stone or brick. Each building has the original iron shutters on the front doors and windows which were added protection from a fire that could sweep through town. Tin roofs were also a fire preventative measure, and in the attics they placed sand and bricks which helped prevent sparks from dropping down. Because of these measures, all the existing buildings survived and are all in their original state, over 120 years later!

 

 

 

In 1848 Amador and a group of friendly Indians established a camp on the banks of the creek which bears his name near what is now Amador City. In 1854 the name Amador was applied to the county as well.

During the fall of 1849 Amador City became the home of four ministers whose zeal for the gospel was second only to their zest for gold. However, one must live and it is to their credit that even after the long backbreaking days spent working their claims they devoted their evenings to preaching “soul saving” sermons throughout the surrounding communities.

 

It was one of these ministers, a Baptist by name of Davidson, who is credited with the discovery of quartz gold in a gully which thereafter was called Minister’s Gulch. That was in 1851 and it was truly a significant find as it marked the original discovery of gold-bearing quartz in Amador County. Samuel Hill, a resident of Buckeye, was later taken in as backer and the company was organized as the Spring Hill Company. About the same time Thomas Rickey and his son James located a vein on the north side of the creek which later became known as the Original Amador. None of these men had ever seen quartz mining before. In fact, up to that time there was none in the world that could compare with what was soon to become common in the Mother Lode country.

 

In the enthusiasm to extract gold, the first stamp mill to be used in the area was brought in and set up. It worked with wooden-stemmed stamps about eight feet long actuated by a wooden camshaft. Mr. Hill of the Spring Hill Company went to Sacramento and bought a steam engine to power the mill. It was badly used and ancient in style and was first thought to be a failure as it took enormous quantities of wood to keep up a head of steam in the boiler; however, it was later rebuilt and some of the mistakes were corrected.