Found in my pan

KevinInColorado

Gold Member
Jan 9, 2012
7,038
11,377
Summit County, Colorado
Detector(s) used
Grizzly Goldtrap Explorer & Motherlode, Gold Cube with trommel or Banker on top, Angus Mackirk Expedition, Gold-n-Sand Xtream Hand pump
Primary Interest:
Prospecting
I found this token in my gold pan when sampling in Cherry Creek in downtown Denver! About the size of a nickel. Says 'no cash value' on one side, 'for amusement only' on the other.
(Also got one flake and a few specks)
 

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I've found old Chinese doins before. They have a square hole punched in the middle
 

What you have there Kevin is a carnival token. I have several I got in a box of junk at a garage sale. My wife looked them up and I believe they were used between 1930's to the 1950's. You never know what treasure you will find.

B H Prospector
 

@BH - thanks! I was wondering. A cool souvenir of my first gold panning visit to Cherry Creek in downtown Denver :)
 

Nope, BH is right. I found a magazine article about it with exact matches to my token :-)
 

Kevin - I too, have found tokens with exact same wording, and chinese coins with the square holes. Reno used to have a "china town" near downtown
and close to the banks of the Truckee river. When the casinos came they bulldozed china town and the brothels from that era. The debris has been eroding
out of the riverbank with each high spring run-off and several big floods. Also found many war era pennies and coins due to Reno being a stopover on railroad
taking new GI's to west coast for shipping on to the Pacific theater.
 

Hey Fullpan, sounds cool. I've heard there is a little gold in the Truckee too right? Sounds like a spot worth visiting! Any tips on where panning/sluicing is allowed in/near town in case I get to visit?
 

Kevin - When I saw cal. flakes and nuggets, I gave no more thought to truckee river in Reno, but with the high price now and gas being so high, it may be
just as economical to walk down to the river and go for the fine gold using the modern drop riffle sluices. I know there's some gold, but how much and what the regs are, have no idea.??? I'll find out.

About 20 years ago, there was a large glass enclosed display of treasures recovered by dredging just below some downtown bridges in the public library. Lots of rings and silver dollars - Reno, crazy town!
 

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More likely to do well in the river than in the casinos I bet!
 

hey kevin do you know if amber is heavy enough to sink to the bottom of the gold pan if your not using salt water
 

No way it will sink under any rocks at all. Density of amber is 1.1, most gravels are 2.5-4 range so amber will move to the top of the material in your pan for sure.
 

lol how cool would that be lol most ppl ive tlk to off the this website dont seem to understand amber isnt a rock but organic fossilized tree sap which gets hard after a few hundred years im almost positive it doesnt take thousand or millions of years to get hard baltic amber also floats in saltwater under piles of seaweed and other vegitation usally mined in the dominican republic amber has also been found in the Americas and the european areas
 

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