Golden Tales – April 8

My Golden Tales of California storytelling program had ended.  The stories were all told. The students’ questions had been answered, and the students were on their way back to their classrooms.  One fourth grade boy turned back and asked, “Do you give autographs?’ 

“Yes.”

“I’ll get a piece of paper and be right back,” he said.

“Make sure it’s all right with your teacher,” I replied.

He came back with three pieces of paper—one for him and two for friends.  I wrote a few words and signed my name.

He looked down at my autograph and asked, “Um. . . Is this autograph valuable?”

I smiled at him. “Not yet,” I said.  It was the first time I had been asked for an autograph and it was a fun experience.

Golden Tales of California is a storytelling program specifically created for fourth grade students to complement their study of California history.  It is the result of extensive research about the Gold Rush Era.  I wanted every fact I used to be accurate. I looked for ways to involve the students. I wanted Gold Rush stories to tell, and I didn’t find any that would work with my program.  So I wrote my own. “The Ghost of Lucky Eddie” is the story of a young miner who had a series of misadventures.  There actually was a miner who was buried up to his neck in dirt when his coyote hole collapsed.  Another miner sold his claim just before the new owner struck it rich. A woman’s foot got tangled in a  runaway mule’s rawhide rope and was drug to death. Gold was discovered in the dirt when the miners were burying a deceased prospector.  I took all of these snippets of story and wrote “The Ghost of Lucky Eddie.”  The Golden Tales of California program captures and holds the attention of fourth graders for fifty minutes and that is a major accomplishment.

I created a persona for myself—Rosie Campbell, the wife of a doctor who came to California on a ship.  I designed and sewed my period costume after extensive research into fashion during the Gold Rush Era.  The outfit that I made is not one that Rosie would wear in the mining camps, but I tell the students that I wear this outfit in high society in San Francisco.  Learning how to move while wearing a hoop petticoat was a learning experience for me. 

Students often ask me, “Were you really alive during the Gold Rush?”

I love that question.  “Let’s do the math,”  I say. When the students realize that I would be over 150 years old, the one who asked the question always looks embarrassed.  At that point I smile and rescue him.  I say, “The fact that you asked that question is a compliment to me.  My stories were so real that you could believe I was alive back then.”  Then I watch a relieved smile appear on my young friend’s face as he nods his head up and down.  

When I remember my gold rush storytelling experiences, I know that I have truly struck it rich.