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The Miner's Den was founded in 1971 at it's present
location Royal Oak, Michigan.
With a family history dating back to the
California gold rush of the 1800's, the Miner's Den
offers unparalleled
knowledge gathered from generations of experience. We maintain
a collection so vast we truly have something for the person who likes the unique and different.
Beginning with a few tons of rock in 1971 the Schowalter family has built the Miner's Den into one
of the leading suppliers of jewelry and jewelry related merchandise
in the country. With a 5,000 sq. foot
showroom, one can view almost
our entire inventory in a comfortable and relaxed atmosphere.
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Will Walker...Dad
called him "Uncle Will"
staked his claim on Rattlesnake Hill during the second great California
Gold Rush in the early 1900’s. Owning nothing but a spunky old mule,
Bluebell, and the most rudimentary of mining supplies, Uncle Will struck
it big in the mountains near Chico. With a fistful of nuggets from his
mine, Uncle Will staked himself to eight prime properties in San Francisco
and roared through the Twenties on his rental profits. When the Great
Depression left him penniless, Uncle Will still considered himself a
wealthy man... he had more than most - a trusted companion, Bluebell, and
a rich and hope-filled lifetime ahead of him, living out his days,
searching for the elusive metal on Rattlesnake Hill.
Just as Uncle Will's claim has remained in the family, the Mining Bug has
bitten every generation since.
For a young college grad in the booming Midwest, the
prosperity of the Post War years held a world of promise, but Dad sought
his new frontiers on more rugged horizons. With a school-chum, he headed
West where they met the old prospectors of Death Valley; worked banana
boats up and down the coast; visited the mining camps near Uncle Will’s
old claim; then hopped "Wrong Way" Corrigan’s ramshackle airlift from
Frisco to Fairbanks to sign-on with The American Smelting and Refining Co.
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First they served as operators on huge, barge-like dredges that chewed up
the frozen tundra tracts and spit-out raw earth behind, digesting its
precious gold ore. Later they served as human watchdogs over a pile of
A.S. & R. gold in a remote cabin on the desolate Alaskan plain, where
there was nothing to do but sock-away their paychecks and plan for the day
they would file their own claim.
Once they built-up a grubstake, they mined the Alaska Territory on their
own for a season, but the only treasure they unearthed was the tusk of a
Wooly Mastodon - a curious souvenir with which to impress the family and
folks back home when Dad took a well-earned vacation from his Wanderlust.
As much as Dad savored the rugged and adventurous prospector’s life, a
stronger passion held him in the palm of this giant mitten that the
glaciers carved... True Love. He stayed. He took the job he had declined
before. He took the hand of the woman who had taken his heart and he
passed his abiding love of the Earth and its treasures on to his sons.
Together they foster that love
in
The Miner's Den.
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