As the violent activity subsided, black smokers continued to belch their mineral rich plumes for millions of years until at last the rock cooled off and the venting stopped. Many times forces beneath the earth disturbed the surface rock and reactivated the vents, but this, too, like the water, gradually subsided. The land lifted, the glaciers came and went, and left behind the clay and sand which transformed the valleys between the rocky ridges into farmland.

One such rocky ridge on the Richardson farm was swept clean of all but a few inches of soil by the force of the glaciers, and in so doing exposed the traces of an ancient vent. Marcus Powell, in finding the rusty-stained vent, recognized it as a possible source of minerals because he recognized that both the rock and the earth which filled the vent were stained dark red by the decomposition of metallic minerals.

He made a pit in the rock as he dug deeper into the vent, and from time time found pieces of rock stained a characteristic blue-green color of oxidized copper, and this led him to believe there may be a good vein of copper below his feet.

About fifteen feet down the floor of the "copper" prospect collapsed beneath his feet and dumped Marcus into small cavern. Created before the ancient venting activities had subsided, the cavern was nearly twelve feet long, six feet high and partly filled with soft sandy dark black earth.

Once recovered from the fall, he brought a flame into the cavern and was astonished to discover that part of the ceiling and some of the rocks in the wall were wondrously speckled with a bright yellow metallic ore he believed was undecomposed copper pyrite.

As the weeks passed, however, it was finally determined by a jeweller from Madoc that wondrous encrustation was not copper, but rather pure gold! News of the discovery made headlines around the world, and by mid October, the Great Eldorado Gold Rush had begun.

In early December, the mine was sold to a group of investors whose great expectations and plans to employ 100 men at the mine proved to be larger than the small deposit could sustain, and within a few years the mine closed down. Over the next forty years there were numerous attempts to make a profit from the mine, but none were met with success.

The gold had been concentrated and deposited in the cavern as part of the venting process, and thus represented isolated and highly unpredictable occurrence, whereas most mines derive their wealth from a vein structure which can be traced for hundreds or thousands of feet. A similar fate befell most of the other mines discovered in the area as a result of the prospecting rush spawned by the stunning richness of Richardson discovery.

Although the Richardson Mine never became commercially profitable, the fact remains that an estimated 3,000 ounces of pure gold were mined from an area of ground not much larger than a swimming pool. Had the mine been worked by Richardson and Powell with help from the community, it could have been a different story, given that most people in the area at the time earned less than two ounces of gold per month.

Caught in the excitement of discovery, it became all too easy to over estimate the potential of the deposit, and this is an aspect of human nature which continues to haunt modern day prospectors. Most mining professionals consider deposits of this nature too small and erratic to justify the expense of a commercial venture.

There is a story regarding a local farmer and part-time miner who is reported to have carried small quantities of waste rock from the mine waste dump to the side of nearby creek where crushed he the rock and panned the crushings for gold. He did this every day during the summer months for years on end. Even working discarded waste from an unprofitable mine, alone and by hand, he was able to earn more in a week than most people at the time earned in month. This also accounts for the fact that the old mine site is suspiciously barren of tailings and waste rock.

This last story is of interest because it highlights the success of a very small scale operation where once a venture with greater expectations and demands had failed. There is today a strong trend toward the development of technologies and equipment suited to small scale commercial deposits, and this has lead to a review of many mineral deposits previously considered too small to be of commercial interest.