Metal Box

This box contains scales for weighing gold and is titled, “Miner’s Improved Gold Scales, manufactured expressly for California”.

The tools needed for mining, like these scales, were sold at a premium. At the time of the Gold Rush, many of the men in the mines did not get nearly as rich as the merchants, like Sam Brannon, who provided them with shovels. Companies often relabeled ordinary merchandise to appeal to hopeful, if inexperienced, miners, and sold the merchandise at a higher price to the California-bound market.