Visit to the Indian Diggings Cemetery and Indian Diggings
Marble Quarry Area in the Summer of 2003

• Indian Diggings Marble Quarry Area and Indian Diggings Cemetery, El Dorado County, California - Visit to the Indian Diggings Cemetery and Indian Diggings Marble Quarry Area in the summer of 2003. (Indian Diggins is near Omo Ranch.)

  My husband Pat and I went on a field trip with the El Dorado Mineral and Gem Club in 2003 to visit the Indian Diggings Cemetery and the area in which the Indian Diggings marble quarries were located. Below are some of the photographs and my account of the field trip and some of the history of the Indian Diggings area.

  We were not able to locate the old Indian Diggings marble quarry or the marble mill that were once owned and operated by Israel Luce and Andrew Aitken, Sacramento stone carvers/businessmen who ran a monument shop together in Sacramento. We believe the quarry area was nearby, but the area is very overgrown with trees and bushes and has changed over time since the late 1800s due to weather-related conditions and the logging activities in the area. If you have any additional information or photographs of this area, please consider contributing them to this section of our web site. Peggy B. Perazzo

  The land on which the quarry area is located is private property which is fenced and gated, so be sure you have permission before attempting a visit. The only way into the area is via dirt roads that are unmarked, unimproved, and difficult to travel over even in the dry season of the year.

  If you are interested in reading my account of our trip to the Indian Diggings Cemetery and marble quarry area, click on my account of our trip to go directly to the account. I have also placed a letter from Israel Luce - the quarry owner - to the Secretary of the State Agricultural Society in 1866 that describes the quarry. (This letter from Israel Luce was contributed by Leeanna M. Ross, author of "Headstones of the Gold Rush Era: Sculpting Masterpieces in Marble.")

  Below are photographs of some of the cemetery stones in the Indian Digging's Cemetery at Indian Diggings and from the Old Sacramento City Cemetery in Sacramento that were made from the local Indian Digging's quarry marble. You can also see stones created from Indian Diggings marble in some of the other Gold Rush country cemeteries. Below the cemetery stone photographs are photographs of marble/liimestone stones in the area of the Indian Diggings quarries.

  If you'd like to learn more about the Gold Country Stone Carvers, you can obtain a copy of Headstones of the Gold Rush Era: Sculpting Masterpieces in Marble, by Leeanna M. Rossi, Golden Notes, Vol. 43, Number 3, Fall 1997, Sacramento County Historical Society, Sacramento, California, 1997, from the Old Sacramento City Cemetery.

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Photographs of Our 2003 Trip to the Indian Diggings Cemetery
and the Indian Diggings Marble Quarry area

This photograph of a Indian Diggings Limestone Deposit is placed here so you can see it in comparison with the stone we found on our trip. (This photograph is taken from "Limestone in California," by Clarence A. Logan, California Journal of Mines and Geology, Vol. 43, No. 3, July 1947, California Division of Mines, San Francisco, California, pp. 175-357. Used with permission, California Department of Conservation, California Geological Survey.)

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