Blue Ridge Camp was renamed Oatman in 1909, and the town boomed from 1910 into the 1920's as gold from these mountains brought as many as 8,000 people there and partially funded World War I in 1912. The gold mines closed about 1942, when mines were needed to mine copper for World War II. Route 66, a 2,400 mile road from Chicago to Los Angeles, winds through Oatman. The Gold Road Mine reopened in 1990, closed in 1999 when gold prices went down, and reopened again in 2010. Burros first came to Oatman with early prospectors, hauling rock and ore inside the mines and carrying water and supplies outside them; after the mines closed, they were released into the hills of Oatman, and they can smell water 20 miles away, carry their babies for 11 months, and live an average of 30 to 35 years.