Business · September 30, 2026

The gold rush is back in California's Inland Empire

Walter Knott (of Knott's Berry Farm) purchased Calico in the 1950s and then used old photographs to restore nearly all of the buildings to their 1880s-era...

A roller coaster rising above a theme park

# The gold rush is back in California's Inland Empire

## In San Bernardino County, gold and silver mining companies are pushing to expand

An aerial view of Calico Ghost Town, a historic silver mining camp that was restored by the founder of Knott’s Berry Farm, seen on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

By Erin Rode, Contributing LA Outdoors EditorFeb 21, 2026

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# The gold rush is back in California's Inland Empire The gold rush is back in California's Inland Empire

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Calico Ghost Town Regional Park certainly did not feel like a ghost town last weekend. The line just to pay entrance fees at the San Bernardino County-managed attraction was at least a dozen cars deep, and neon-vested parking attendants tried to quell the sudden rush of traffic at the remote park as a shuttle ferried visitors from far-flung corners of the dirt parking lot to the town’s entrance. Once inside, visitors had their pick of a jam-packed schedule of events that included live bands, historical reenactments, pony rides and gun-draw competitions. Cold beers were poured at Lil’s Saloon at a nearly proportional rate to the number of parents buying prop guns for their kids as souvenirs.

Thousands of people descended on the tiny ghost town north of Barstow last weekend for the fifth annual Calico California Days, an event advertised as a celebration of California’s early history. Visitors stepped back in time, panning for fake gold nuggets and touring long-abandoned mining tunnels. Performers in 19th century garb played banjos and staged gunfights. But while the event offered a glimpse of California’s past, the giant mining corporations that sponsored the festivities are already hard at work excavating the region’s future.

The two-day Calico Ghost Town event was sponsored by three mining companies, including two that are actively seeking to expand their operations in San Bernardino County. Mitsubishi Cement Corporation, which operates a cement plant in Lucerne Valley along the edge of San Bernardino National Forest, provided a lump-sum payment of $2,500 to help defray the costs of the event, according to sponsorship agreements reviewed by SFGATE. So did Equinox Gold’s Castle Mountain project, which is awaiting approval to quadruple its operations at a mine that’s surrounded by Castle Mountains National Monument, which itself is surrounded by the vast Mojave National Preserve.

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Apollo Silver, which is in the exploration and development phase of a silver mine project in the Calico area, provided $5,000 in sponsorship funding for the event. Apollo calls its Calico project “one of the largest undeveloped primary silver assets in the U.S.”

The payments act “as a way to provide opportunities to COUNTY’S businesses and to encourage a marketing environment targeting a niche audience,” states the sponsorship agreements.

The main street of Calico Ghost Town Regional Park, located north of Barstow in San Bernardino County, on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

One of many 19th century-styled buildings restored at the historic Calico Ghost Town.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

And at Calico California Days, the companies received about as niche an audience as they could imagine: Southern Californians, including some who could be directly affected by an influx of new mining operations in this pocket of the state, seeking a fresh dose of nostalgia for the Gold Rush era.

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## ‘Calico lives again’

Spanning over 20,000 square miles of suburbs, exurbs, mountains and deserts, San Bernardino County is the largest county in the entire contiguous United States. The region’s diverse landscape has long translated into plenty of opportunities for mining companies looking to turn a profit.

“No portion of California has more diversified mineral wealth than the County of San Bernardino… In its rugged mountains and desert \[expanse\], are found a wide range of geological formations from Paleozoic to Tertiary, and a great variety of rocks of igneous origin… The mines are scattered all over its thousands of square miles of territory, and have already added millions of dollars to the wealth of the State and the world,” California’s state mineralogist said over a century ago in 1893.

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There are still around 90 active mines in San Bernardino County, extracting everything from sand and gravel to salt, iron and gypsum. And just off Interstate 15 near the California-Nevada border sits the Mountain Pass Rare Earth Mine, the only operational rare earth mine in the country. After shuttering in the early 2000s, that facility restarted a few years ago amid the rush for critical minerals and now produces over 10% of the world’s rare earth supply, according to MP Materials.

Back in the 1880s, silver was king in San Bernardino County, and for a while, Calico was the epicenter of the region’s burgeoning mining industry. At one time, 70% of the state’s silver production came from the inland county, and 80% of that silver came from Calico specifically, where a town quickly popped up around the silver mine. Calico’s population grew to a couple of thousand people at its height, and the mine’s remote location, far from major population centers, led to the town establishing its own sheriff and courthouse. Like countless other California Gold Rush communities of that era, Calico quickly became a fully self-sufficient town in miniature, with stores, a cemetery and a schoolhouse.

A view of the hillsides surrounding Calico Ghost Town, a regional park managed by San Bernardino County that celebrates California’s early history, on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

A view of the hillsides surrounding Calico Ghost Town, a regional park managed by San Bernardino County that celebrates California’s early history, on Feb. 15, 2025.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

And like other mining boomtowns of that era, when the market shifted, the town just as quickly disappeared. In Calico, the boom was short, and the town’s population started declining alongside the silver market in the 1890s. The end of borax mining in 1907 officially transitioned Calico to its ghost town era.

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But unlike other Gold Rush ghost towns, Calico was carefully restored to its former glory with a theme park builder’s eye for detail. Walter Knott (of Knott’s Berry Farm) purchased Calico in the 1950s and then used old photographs to restore nearly all of the buildings to their 1880s-era appearance. The town was proclaimed “ California’s official Silver Rush Ghost Town” by then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2005.

“Calico lives again,” reads a sign, ominously, near the beginning of Calico’s main street today. The large stone slab notes that Walter Knott dedicated the town’s restoration “to the memory of the heroic silver miners who lived and toiled here.”

“The preservation of this singular California heritage is also dedicated to you, the visitor, as a constant source of learning and enjoyment,” states the sign.

## A new gold and silver rush

To hear Apollo Silver Corporation describe it, the Calico area’s peak mining era might still be ahead. Apollo’s Calico Project is located in the same historic Calico Silver Mining District that once housed the miners of Calico Ghost Town; the proposed project brings the two main silver properties in the area under the same ownership for the first time. An updated mineral resource estimate announced by Apollo last year found a combined total of over 180 million ounces of silver to be likely available. For comparison, only an estimated 15 million to 20 million ounces of silver was mined in Calico through 1896.

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A 20-mule team hauls ore from Borate through Mule Canyon (Calico) to Daggett circa the 1880s.

Courtesy of San Bernardino County

Calico silver ore processing at the Oro Grande stamp mill in 1883.

Courtesy of San Bernardino County

Apollo is hoping that the Trump administration’s decision to add silver to the U.S. Geological Survey’s List of Critical Minerals could give the project a boost, calling the action an “emergency alarm” and Calico “an irreplaceable first responder.”

“Calico has the potential to become a long-term strategic asset to the economic and military security of the United States, rather than simply a short-term trade story,” states a February post on Apollo’s website. The project also has another factor working in its favor, according to Apollo: its location in a “ mining-friendly” county.

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The mining industry was the star of the county’s most recent State of the County presentation in September, where officials and local high schoolers highlighted the recent mining reactivation and expansion boom. The county of just over 2 million people now has 6,974 jobs in the mining and natural resources sector, with a 10-year forecast employment growth rate of 10.2%.

“I’m proud to share that San Bernardino County is the largest mining county in California, with more than 90 active sites. Our county’s diverse mining industry is both an important and valued sector for our regional economy while also providing a highly competitive resource advantage to our nation,” San Bernardino County Supervisor Paul Cook said in a recorded message during the annual event.

One of the mining efforts spotlighted by the county was Equinox Gold’s Castle Mountain project, a massive expansion of a gold mine surrounded by protected public lands that’s been opposed by environmental groups. The project is in the early stages of the environmental review process; a scoping report that gathered public comments was published in December, and the Bureau of Land Management and San Bernardino County are now working on a draft environmental review document. A final decision is expected later this year.

Calico Ghost Town Regional Park is managed by San Bernardino County and located north of Barstow, off Interstate 15.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

Old mining tunnels and related infrastructure are on view at Calico Ghost Town Regional Park north of Barstow, seen here on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

Equinox Gold wants to “effectively quadruple the annual mining rate from 18 to 80 million tons,” according to the scoping report, which would require 2,250 acre-feet per year of groundwater (an average California household uses between.5 and 1 acre-foot of water each year). Expanding the mine pits and installing a new water pipeline and power line would disturb an additional 1,800 acres of Bureau of Land Management lands beyond what the site has already impacted.

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The Bureau of Land Management and the county received over 2,000 individual submissions that raised concerns, via a form letter, about a litany of issues. Some worried about a proposed right-of-way through Avi Kwa Ame National Monument, while others highlighted negative impacts on Castle Mountains National Monument and Mojave National Preserve, increased traffic and pollution, threats to groundwater, and impacts on wildlife and vegetation.

“Overall, the sentiment among commenters was that the scale of the project is incompatible with the protection of outstanding visual, recreational, and ecological resources and is unacceptable,” the scoping report states.

These comments were not reflected in San Bernardino County’s own framing of the project in September (which predated the scoping document). At the State of the County event, one of the local high schoolers tasked with reading the prewritten presentation aloud said Castle Mountain mine “is expected to become the largest gold producer in California.”

“Upon approval, Castle Mountain will substantially increase its production while continuing its commitment to environmentally responsible mining practices. Increasing the mine’s production is important to support the domestic production of both gold and silver, especially since gold is a mineral designated as essential to national security, advancing technologies and developing infrastructure,” the teenage presenter said.

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Visitors line up for gold panning at Calico California Days at Calico Ghost Town Regional Park on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

Old mining tunnels and related infrastructure are on view at Calico Ghost Town Regional Park north of Barstow, seen here on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

Chance Wilcox, California desert program manager at the National Parks Conservation Association, said in an emailed statement that “extensive energy development is already putting immense pressure on park ecosystems.”

“Right now, a proposed expansion of Castle Mountain Mine, led by Equinox Gold, is threatening to industrialize the landscape at the doorstep of Castle Mountains National Monument just next to Mojave National Preserve,” wrote Wilcox, who said that the industrial infrastructure and transmission lines could attract ravens, which predate on desert tortoises, and that the expansion’s groundwater use could impact fragile aquifers and springs.

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“National parks are not industrial mining zones, and it is our responsibility to protect our public lands and the beauty of the Mojave from irresponsible development,” Wilcox continued.

In an email to SFGATE, Aren Hall, environmental and permitting manager for Castle Mountain Mine, said Equinox Gold “takes seriously its commitment to responsible mining practices and transparent public comment and engagement.”

“Concerns raised during the public scoping period are being evaluated as part of the environmental review process.... Public comments are crucial as they inform the EIS/EIR process by their incorporation into project alternatives, which are intended to further reduce project impacts,” Hall wrote.

The main street of Calico Ghost Town Regional Park, located north of Barstow in San Bernardino County, on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

Old mining tunnels and related infrastructure are on view at Calico Ghost Town Regional Park north of Barstow, seen here on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

And for Equinox, part of the public engagement process includes a front-row seat to Calico California Days, which the company has sponsored every year since its inception, Hall said. “These opportunities allow us to engage directly with the community, share factual project information, and listen to questions, comments, and concerns firsthand. This outreach complements the formal public scoping processes led by the Bureau of Land Management and San Bernardino County officials,” Hall wrote.

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“Most people don’t know that there’s still commercial-scale gold mining occurring \[in California\],” Hall added briefly when reached by phone. “So that’s an interesting conversation to have with folks.”

It’s unclear how many of the thousands of Calico visitors last weekend noticed the mining companies underwriting their old-timey revelry. The energy was rowdy last Sunday, with impromptu gunfights often breaking out among visitors (adults and children alike) eager to whip out their newly purchased props.

Yellow banners dotting the property listed the event’s three sponsors, who also had a dedicated space near the entrance of the event to set up tables, distribute materials and gain an audience among the crowd. In truth, that area was pretty quiet on Sunday afternoon, with most visitors seeming more interested in gunfighting, gold panning or beer chugging over learning about local mining endeavors.

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Pony rides at Calico California Days at Calico Ghost Town Regional Park, seen here on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

A staged gunfight at the Calico California Days event on Feb. 15, 2026.

Erin Rode/SFGATE

The gold panning station was in particularly high demand, with families lining up to sift through water for fake gold nuggets. But if they’d visited the present-day mining companies’ station, they could have pursued gold mining for real: Equinox was hiring.

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Feb 21, 2026

Erin Rode

Contributing LA Outdoors Editor

Erin Rode is SFGATE’s Contributing Los Angeles Outdoors Editor. Erin grew up in Los Angeles County and has hiked area trails for over a decade. She previously covered the environment for The Desert Sun in Palm Springs.

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