Yankee Fork Gold Dredge

Brought in by the Snake River Mining Company in 1940 to mechanically recover gold missed by central Idaho’s earlier prospectors, the massive Yankee Fork Gold Dredge operated successfully for about 12 years. Located on the Yankee Fork of Idaho’s Salmon River between the ghost towns of Bonanza and Custer (nine miles down a wide gravel/dirt road off State Highway 75, thirteen miles east of Stanley, Idaho), you can’t help notice evidence of the dredging—huge mounds of gravel and rock alongside the road. The dredge left behind over five miles of these "dredge tailings" as it worked its way upstream.

From 1940 until all the company’s claims were worked out in1952, the enormous dredge dug out 6,000,000 cubic yards of stream gravel and recovered an estimated $1,200,000 in gold. The deteriorating dredge sat unused for a few decades, and then was donated to the Forest Service. A dedicated, hardworking group of volunteers eventually restored the Yankee Fork Gold Dredge and it’s now open for tours for a nominal charge from Memorial Day through Labor Day. You’ll definitely want to take a peek inside!

Its gigantic dimensions of the Yankee Fork Gold Dredge are quite impressive—112 feet long, 54 feet wide, 64 feet high and it weighs 988 tons. There are 71 buckets on one continuous chain and each bucket holds 8 cubic feet of dirt. In its heyday, the dredge was considered very efficient and was powered by two 7-cylinder diesel engines that produced the electricity to operate the dredge. The Yankee Fork Gold Dredge remains the largest self-powered dredge ever to operate in Idaho.

While in the area, be sure to visit the nearby gold mining ghost towns of Bonanza City and Custer. After looking around and reading the interpretive signs, you’ll gain an abundant appreciation for how precarious the livelihood of mining towns really was—rising and falling solely based on the availability of gleaming gold.