Actually, I did know about this.
Goldville is maybe 30 miles from my home. A lot of creeks in the area contain gold. Have several friends who prospect as a hobby. My dad and his buddy gave it a try. Gave it up. Hard work! For not much return. There surely is such a thing as “Gold Fever”. I’ve seen it in people that find a few small flakes. You would figure with the price of gold as it is that it would become profitable to prospect. But, as I said, it’s a lot of hard work.
The same thing happened in Dahlonega, GA. When those miners heard that they were picking it up in chunks in California, they all left. The congressman of that time asked them to stay because “there’s gold in them thar hills”. They didn’t.
A lot of that is now federal land, but under certain hobby limits you can still look for gold there AFAIK. I had a friend in Atlanta who was picking up $200/week in the spring (runoff from snow in the mountains) with hobby level equipment - and that’s when gold was $200/oz. He showed me a nugget of about an ounce, which he told me was worth more than it’s weight in gold because it was a “natural nugget”. I was going to try my hand at it with some used equipment he had but I moved.
Huh.