Treadwell gold mine trade who had come to Alaska prior to the Klondike Gold Rush. In 1880, prospectors Joseph 'Joe' Juneau and Richard Harris discovered gold in Silver Bow Basin. This brought waves of prospectors to the region, including John Treadwell, whose first move was to purchase a lode claim on Douglas Island from Pierre Joseph Erussard ("French Pete") on 13 Sept. 1881. Treadwell formed a partnership in Sept. 1881 with Erussard de Ville, D.P. Mitchell and Dave Martin under the name of The San Francisco Company. For unknown reasons he later backed out of this, and in early December 1881 he devoted
Juneau gold belt fissure fillings of the area are comparable with the California "mother lode" deposits. Most of the gold mines in the Juneau belt occur in the band of black slate which lies between the schists to the northeast and the greenstones to the southwest. "The complex of veins which follow this black slate is described as the main lode system of the Juneau belt." "Parallelism of vein systems and ore deposits with the outcrops of bed-rock formations...is one of the noteworthy characteristics of the district." This results in a "linear distribution of the mines." Most of the gold deposits are found