Dredging
Ben Stanley Revett introduced dredging to Summit County in 1898. It was a terribly destructive gold mining process that left a wake of waste behind. The dredge boat would float on a man made pond while a continuous line of digging buckets at the front of the dredge excavated sediments to bedrock, bringing the gold laden gravel to the surface. The gold was separated from the rock on board the dredge using mercury and other processes. All the waste rock material was dumped out the back of the dredge boat leaving miles of piles of rock waste. The dredge boats made their way up and down the rivers and creeks in Summit county literally upturning the waterways and burying them under gravel.
