-134-
#60 --- The following interesting stories told by
miners can be found on pages 128-132 of "THE CALIFORNIA FOLKLORE QUARTERLY" (now
"WESTERN FOLKLORE") April, 1942 issue. The article, titled "California Miners'
Folklore: Below Ground", was written by Wayland D. Hand:
“...John
Baragwanath’s treatis of the gnomes in mines of Peru that assist miners in finding
ore deposits. His article, ‘Pay Streak,’ which appeared in COSMOPOLITAN for
November, 1936, pp. 56ff., and 78ff., contains an excellent likeness of one of
these quaint little creatures, the so-called ‘Muqul.’ In ‘Spooks, Specters, and Superstitions in
Mining,’ (THE MINING JOURNAL, XXI., May 30, 1937., pp. 5,40) Fisher Vane treats
the various beliefs in ‘Tommy knockers’ as found in western mines. cf. ARIZONA:
A STATE GUIDE (New York, 1940), p.164. Walter G. Drysdale, editor of the
PLACERVILLE TIMES, writes a column under the heading of "Tommy
knockers," and in some of his columns during 1939 dealt with California
beliefs in these little creatures ‘attired in leather jackets, peaked hats and
water-soaked shoes.’ California Indian miners have a belief in little, squat,
fat men, called, I am informed, ‘ettedi’..."
"...As
indicated above, few California miners aver
that they have seen Tommy knockers, though one miner at the Murchie in Nevada City
quit his job when he saw ‘a little old man with whiskers comin' out of the muck
pile.’
"...At the Mayflower Mine east of Nevada City
there was a long tunnel from which strange noises were said to emanate. One man
hearing these weird sounds is reported to have ran out of the tunnel one night
and not to have stopped until he was a long way from the mine."
"...A
miner at the Murchie Mine in Nevada
City refused to reenter a
drift because he said he had seen ‘devils back in there.’ He was probably like
the man in