В Плейсервилли возложат венок к 100-летию памятника Друидов, помогавшего семьям шахтеров

On Saturday, Sept. 5, at 10 a.m., Friends of Historic Hangtown will lay a floral wreath at the Druids Monument at Cedar Ravine Road and Main Street in Placerville to commemorate its 100th anniversary. Why is the Druids Monument there? Many have passed the Druids Monument thousands of times and not known what it is all about. And why is it there? For Placerville, gold was the reason for being. Mining in the early days was a very dangerous enterprise. Miners were often killed or maimed. When that happened, who would take care of their families? Times were tough. There was no Social Security, no unemployment compensation, no government safety net. You could not rely on the government; you had to depend on each other. And people did. It was an important part of the core values of those who built this town. Few women had jobs in the late 1800s. And those widows who did often had to do things like take in boarders or do jobs such as seamstress work, laundry or cooking to scrape some income together to support their families. The Druids raised money to support families of those killed or injured in the mines. The Druids, established in 1858 by Frederick Sieg, was one of many philanthropic fraternal orders in Placerville. Like the churches, was an important part of the social fabric of the town. Without help from neighbors, families of fallen miners would have been destitute, left in horrible shape. Ever think about that? I have, from time to time, for a very personal reason. This history is part of my own family’s story. The gold miner in the middle of the photograph of three miners is my paternal grandfather, Thomas Cristian Smith. My grandfather, Jerimiah Callan, was in Placerville in 1848, staking his claim with the Big Chunk Mine. A great-uncle, John McGraw, was killed in a mining accident in Kelsey in the late 1800s, and it was his fraternal organization that paid for his burial expenses and provided support for his wife and infant son. Those who preceded us from those early days followed those central values — honesty, hard work and taking care of your neighbors. The monument, installed in 1926 and dedicated to the Druid founder, pays homage to those core values. It was placed in the honored center of that intersection purposely so travelers could see it both coming to and leaving Placerville, according to news accounts of that day. The stained-glass, illuminated torch at the top of that tall stone tower is a symbol of enlightenment, just as is true for the torch on the Statue of Liberty. There were many fraternal orders in town — Eastern Star, Masons, IOOF, Druids, Knights of Columbus, just to name a few — and all sponsored a variety of social causes. The local IOOF lodge also raised money to support the families of injured miners. Volunteerism, helping our neighbors, was an important part of who we were, and we might hope, still are.