A Mount Shasta artist known for his multimedia exhibit about the contributions of Black people during California’s Gold Rush is about to premier his new movie on the topic.

Filmed in Siskiyou County, Mark Oliver’s “The Golden Ghosts” opens on April 21 at the Riverfront Playhouse in Redding.

The movie is a work of historical fiction based on actual events from the North State’s gold mining days, Oliver said.

The film aims to bring understanding about some of the experiences of the thousands of Black prospectors who flocked to California more than 150 years ago seeking gold-fueled fortunes.

Oliver and his crew shot the film entirely in Siskiyou, Shasta and Tehama counties during the summer and early autumn of 2023 at sites including William B. Ide Adobe State Historic Park, the McCloud area near Fall River and places north of Weed.

While researching his Golden Ghosts project, Oliver worked with Mount Shasta archaeologist Patrick Brunmeier. The two scanned old maps and visited sites in Siskiyou County with place names indicating Black people had lived and mined there in the 1800s.

‘A part of history that’s never been in the history books’

While U.S. Census data shows many Black Americans lived in far Northern California in the mid-1800s, their contributions aren’t widely recognized, Oliver said.

For more than a decade, Oliver has sought to correct that omission.

His past projects include bringing the “Voices of the Golden Ghosts” play to Shasta College in 2019, presenting a documentary exhibit of historic photos and stories from the era that was displayed at Turtle Bay Exploration Park and other venues in 2020 and writing an illustrated history book last year.

His other films include “From the Quarters to Lincoln Heights,” a 2011 documentary about the migration of Black people from the American South starting in the 1920s to Weed, McCloud and other North State lumber towns. It was while researching that documentary in 2009 that Oliver said he learned of the role of Black people during Siskiyou County’s gold rush.

In his book “Voices of the Golden Ghosts,” Oliver wrote that as miners from around the globe descended on Northern California aiming to strike it rich, “by 1852, over 2,000 men of African American descent were in the California goldfields” after the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill in the small El Dorado County town of Coloma in 1848. By 1860, more than 5,000 Black Americans “had made the difficult trek to California in search of quick wealth,” according to Rudolph Lapp, in his book “Blacks in Gold Rush California.”

Those Black 49ers included both free and enslaved people, who mined alone, formed their own companies or teamed up with white prospectors, Lapp’s book said.

The making of “The Golden Ghosts”

In the film, Black protagonists Money and Tall arrive in the North State, as did many others from varying backgrounds who streamed into the area in the early 1850s, searching for gold. While prospecting, the pair meet a Chinese herbalist who runs a brothel, a Mexican couple who caution them about the risks of encountering white settlers and two Native Americans who have been mistreated by white miners.

The characters and their experiences are composites of people who mined gold in the North State, Oliver said. They’re heading West, Oliver said, “probably toward the Salmon River or the Klamath River.”In the mid-1800s, Black people mined mostly their own claims, not for a company. They searched for gold in remote regions with rough terrains to avoid clashing with other miners, Brunmeier said. By the late 1800s, Black people worked as paid laborers for mining companies at several Siskiyou County mines, including Forks of Salmon.

Mining was dangerous, especially for Black people at the time of slavery in the U.S.

While California was founded as a free state, for Black people “if you didn’t have papers proving you were free … you could be arrested and sent back” to slave owners in other states, Brunmeier said.

More: 27 African-American North State sports influencers honored to celebrate Juneteenth

Local actors performed most of the parts in the movie, including Dunsmuir actor and musician Victor Martin, who played Tall in the film.

“Tall is kind of a reasonable guy. He thinks before he takes action,” said Martin. Money, played by Fred Magee of Redding, is quicker to act, Martin said.

Part of what shaped the two characters so differently is that Tall legally gained his freedom from slavery. Money had escaped slavery to reach California. So Money lived in fear of bounty hunters capturing and returning him to people in another state who claimed they owned him, Martin said.

Both characters live their lives in peril, as did almost all Black, Asian, Native American and other people during Old West times. “I’m glad I wasn’t born in those days,” said Martin. “You had to be a tough individual. I wouldn’t have made it.”

More than a story, the film derives impact by depicting “a part of history that’s never been in the history books,” Martin said.

A special treat for fans of Martin’s music at his Pops Performing Arts and Cultural Center jazz club club in Dunsmuir: The character Tall is a musician and in the movie, Martin breaks out his famous saxophone.

Martin said he worked hard to make his sax echo traditional Native American music. While on location in Siskiyou County, he said, “we could feel the spirit” of the people who had been hunted and abused.

Note to readers: If you appreciate the work we do here at the Redding Record Searchlight, please consider subscribing yourself or giving the gift of a subscription to someone you know.

If you go: “The Golden Ghosts” film premier

• Where: Riverfront Playhouse, 1950 California St. in Redding
• When: Noon and 3 p.m. on April 21. A reception with the actors follows the 3 p.m. show.
• Cost: Tickets are $12 in advance, $15 at the door. Go to markoliver.org/golden-ghosts-film to buy tickets.
• Information: Go to markoliver.org

Jessica Skropanic is a features reporter for the Record Searchlight/USA Today Network. She covers science, arts, social issues and news stories. Follow her on Twitter @RS_JSkropanic and on Facebook. Join Jessica in the Get Out! Nor Cal recreation Facebook group. To support and sustain this work, please subscribe today. Thank you.