In 1851, miners drawn by rumors of gold in Oregon turned north to the Rogue Valley, slogged through the mud to Coyote Creek, staked claims, and worked as long as the gold lasted, making hard trips to Grave Creek for provisions and living a transient life shaped by uncertain fortunes. Seventeen years after the gold rush began, miners were using hydraulic mining, forcing creek water under high pressure to process soil and extract gold. William Ruble, impressed by the method's efficiency, bought several claims, sent for his sons, and began work, but the family could not move soil fast enough to profit and could not work in summer when creek water levels dropped. Instead of leaving, the Ruble sons invented the Ruble rock elevator. In the late nineteenth century, while many rough boom towns rose and quickly disappeared wherever gold was found, Golden grew into a thriving, family-centered community of more than 100 people in the 1890s, sustained by the constant profit from the Ruble elevator.