boomtownA town whose population shoots up almost overnight. San Francisco grew from about 1,000 people in 1848 to 25,000 by 1850.
claimA piece of land a miner marked as theirs to work. Marking the land was called staking a claim.
fool's goldPyrite, a shiny yellow mineral often mistaken for gold. Pyrite is made of iron and sulfur.
forty-ninerSomeone who joined the gold rush the year after it began. The name comes from the year 1849.
ghost townA town left empty after its people moved away. For a while in 1848 San Francisco was nearly a ghost town: its people had left for the gold fields.
gold dustGold in tiny grains, as fine as sand. A day of panning might leave a few grains of gold dust in the pan.
gold rushA hurry of many people to a place where gold was found. The California Gold Rush began in 1848.
minerA worker who takes gold or other ore from the earth. The first miners of the Gold Rush worked along the American River.
mining campA rough settlement that sprang up near the diggings. Miners lived in tents and wooden shanties.
mother lodeThe chief band of gold-bearing rock in a mining region. California's Mother Lode is a long belt of gold deposits in the Sierra Nevada.
nuggetA chunk of gold big enough to pick up by hand. Streams gather nuggets and finer gold into the same beds of gravel.
prospectorSomeone who roams the land looking for signs of gold. A prospector might test the gravel of many streams before finding gold.
Show all 36 terms (24 more)
How the gold was mined 12
assayA test that shows how much gold is in a sample. An assay tells how pure a piece of gold is.
hydraulic miningWashing down hillsides with jets of water to reach gold. In 1884 a court ruling restricted it because of the mud it sent down the rivers.
oreStone with gold or another metal locked inside it. Gold ore has to be crushed to get the gold out.
panningWashing gravel in a pan so the heavy gold stays. Panning was the first way the miners of 1848 got their gold.
pickaxeA swinging tool with a metal spike on a wooden handle. Miners used pickaxes to dig for gold deep in the ground.
placerLoose gold mixed into the sand and gravel of a stream. Placers lie in the beds of streams, some of them long dry.
quartzA hard mineral in which veins of gold are often found. Quartz is made of silicon and oxygen.
rockerA box rocked like a cradle to sift gold from gravel. A rocker was also called a cradle.
shaftA deep narrow hole dug straight down into the ground. Miners of the Gold Rush dug shafts as deep as forty feet.
sluiceA long sloped trough that catches gold as water runs. Bars called riffles on the bottom of a sluice trap the gold.
stamp millA machine that crushes ore by pounding it. A stamp mill pounds the ore; it does not grind it.
veinA thin sheet of mineral filling a crack in rock. Miners tunneled underground in search of veins that held gold.
The way to California 12
American RiverA California river that flows out of the Sierra Nevada. It joins the Sacramento River at the city of Sacramento.
California TrailThe wagon route west across the plains and mountains. It ran about 1,600 miles from towns on the Missouri River.
Cape HornA headland at the far southern end of South America. A voyage from the East Coast around Cape Horn could take five months.
Isthmus of PanamaThe narrow land joining North and South America. Travelers crossed it on the way from one ocean to the other.
merchantSomeone who keeps a store and sells goods to customers. In the gold country, merchants sold the miners the goods they needed.
SacramentoThe trading town for the mines, now the state capital. It grew up on the Sacramento River, on Sutter's land.
San FranciscoThe port city where ships of gold seekers landed. Until 1847 it was a village called Yerba Buena.
Sierra NevadaThe tall range of peaks east of California's big valley. The gold country lay in its western foothills.
statehoodThe standing of an equal partner among the states. California gained statehood on September 9, 1850.
steamshipA ship moved by a steam engine. Steamships carried gold seekers from Panama to San Francisco.
Sutter's MillThe sawmill where gold was found in January 1848. It stood beside the American River's South Fork, at Coloma.
wagon trainMany wagons making a long trip as one party. Families in a wagon train helped one another on the trail.
How this list was compiled: Term list chosen for this site on 2026-10-09. Each meaning is written in our own words and was checked that day against the English Wikipedia article on the term (https://en.wikipedia.org/), whose text is under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license: California gold rush, Gold rush, 49er, Prospecting, Gold nugget, Boomtown, Ghost town, Mining community, Mother lode, Pyrite, Gold panning, Placer mining (sluice, placer), Rocker box, Pickaxe, Hydraulic mining, Vein (geology), Ore, Stamp mill, Metallurgical assay, Quartz, Sutter's Mill, American River, Sierra Nevada, San Francisco, Sacramento, California, California Trail, Cape Horn, Isthmus of Panama, Wagon train and Steamship. Miner, claim, gold dust, shaft, statehood and merchant were checked against the entry for the term in Wiktionary, the free dictionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/), under the same license. The history in the meanings and the examples was checked a second time against the essays The Discovery of Gold, The Forty-Niners, The Mines, Towns and Cities and Government and Law in Early California History: An Overview, published by the Library of Congress (https://www.loc.gov/collections/california-first-person-narratives/articles-and-essays/early-california-history/). The example after each meaning is our own. Licence: own work
How it works
These gold rush worksheets for 4th grade social studies are three matching sheets of twelve terms on the California Gold Rush, each with an answer key. The first has forty-niner, prospector, claim, nugget, boomtown and ghost town.
Read the full guide
How the gold was mined
In Set, the second sheet has the tools and the methods: panning, sluice, rocker, placer, pickaxe, shaft, hydraulic mining, vein, ore, stamp mill, assay and quartz.
The way to California
The third sheet has the places and the routes: Sutter's Mill, American River, Sierra Nevada, San Francisco, Sacramento, California Trail, Cape Horn, Isthmus of Panama, wagon train, steamship, statehood and merchant. Under the tool each term has a fact from the history, checked against essays of the Library of Congress.
These sheets are vocabulary only: they do not tell what the Gold Rush cost the Native peoples of California.
Questions and answers
When did the California Gold Rush start?
Gold was found at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, on the American River, on January 24, 1848. Gold seekers from outside California began to arrive in large numbers the next year, which is why they are called forty-niners.
How did the forty-niners get to California?
By three main routes: overland by wagon across the plains and through the mountain passes, by ship around Cape Horn, a voyage that could take five months, or by ship to Panama, across the isthmus and on by a second ship.
How did miners find gold in the Gold Rush?
At first by panning: swirling stream gravel and water in a pan until the heavy gold was left. Rockers and sluices washed more gravel at a time. Later, miners dug shafts to reach veins of quartz and washed down hillsides with hoses.
Are there gold rush worksheets for 3rd grade?
The same three sheets print for any class. The Gold Rush has the plainest words, such as miner, nugget and ghost town, and Pairs prints a sheet of four to ten in place of twelve.