Barbara Lawlor, Gold Hill. Last Friday a cloud descended on Gold Hill. The Colorado Mountain Ranch loomed dark and eerie through the mist, but none of  the 103 students spread over the ranch property noticed the gathering haze .

There were 75 students from Mesa Elementary School, 15 students from Jamestown, and 13 students from Gold Hill gathered at the ranch. Some of them were panning for gold, some were lassoing a bull made of logs and fake horns, and one lively group danced the Virginia Reel in the upper loft, swinging their partners.

The Gold Hill students dressed in costume, like the miners and schoolteachers from 1859 when the Gold Town Meeting was established. They showed the children from Mesa how to sift gold from the dirt they washed in the gold pans. The Mesa students learned how to circle the lasso around the horns of the bull. They learned to bow to their partners.

After attending the various activities, all of the students gathered for the annual reliving of the first Gold Hill Town Meeting, put on by the Gold Hill School third, fourth, and fifth grade students. It was1859 and the California Gold Rush was playing out. During that winter gold was discovered in Gold Hill, bringing over 1,000 people to town to make their fortune.

The town meeting was called to establish the Gold Hill Mining District. The members had to choose a constable, and determine how big a mining claim could be. The women stood up and told the men that they were banning “that devil liquor.” The girls acted the righteous, outraged women perfectly.

When the play ended, the students ambled en masse from to the town, to a field across from the Gold Hill Inn, where they watched Dave Lasky of Sugarloaf make a horseshoe from a straight piece of stock steel. Lasky is now a professional farrier and was happy to share his craft with the children. "The one thing I've learned when I go to the schools is not to give a five-year-old boy a two-pound hammer to play with," says Lasky, as the boys in the group eyed his hammer.

One boy noted, "If a horse walks too much with no shoes, it's hooves could crack in half." Lasky agreed.

Blacksmith Emmit Hoyl from Rollinsville showed the students how he forges steel drills. Andrew Martinek pumped the air to keep the coke fuel burning. The students were impressed when they learned that Emmit  was the World Champion Single Jack driller in the mining contest circuit.

A large tent strewn with animal skins and bowls of herbs welcomed the students to the world of a Traveling Rendezvous exhibit. Becca and Taryn West Hawk showed the kids how medicine was made in the old days and how warm clothes were made from animal fur.

The students headed back up the hill to the school, stopping at the Gold Hill Museum on the way. There they saw many of the old appliances powered by humans rather than electricity. They heard Marilyn Soby play an old church organ and they watched a slide show presenting dramatic images from the Fourmile Fire.

The girls gasped as they looked at big old houses being consumed by flames, a crown fire roaring along the tops of the pine trees. Many of the students were from Boulder and did not realize how the devastating fire affected those who lived in the area. It was a fire that took its place in Gold Hill history.

Being a part of the story, walking the same streets, and entering the same buildings as their mining predecessors made a visual and audible impact on the students. This is one part of history they will not soon forget.