Blessings Friends! Read this very interesting story today and wanted to share it with you...
In October 1850, gold was discovered in the district of Grass
Valley, California. Over the next 91 years, at least one million
dollars in gold was produced annually from the mines in
that area.
Michael Brennan, a 36-year-old journalist with the New York Herald, heard about the mining claims at a place called Massachusetts Hill, overlooking Grass Valley. He had no experience in
mining, but a group of Irish New York investors bought the mine
and chose Brennan to go west and supervise it.
He sailed from New York with his beautiful wife, Dorinda, and
their three children, crossed over the Panama Isthmus (before
the canal was built), and then again by ship until they reached
northern California.
He built a large comfortable home atop Massachusetts Hill,
fully expecting that gold-bearing quartz would flow out from his
mine below.
Everything went well for a while and within a few months a
sizeable dividend was declared. Convinced that an even richer
vein of gold lay further along the shaft, Brennan had his men attack
the mine with all the equipment and vigor they could bring
to bear. Every dollar he could raise went into the mining operation,
but all the effort produced nothing.
Deeper and deeper his men dug the shaft, looking for the
precious gold-bearing quartz. But the gold had vanished. Brennan
was advised by others to give up the quest, but he soldiered
on. W hen his company could no longer finance his work, he
spent his own money and used up every cent. Finally, no creditor
would back him and he had to lay off all his men.
He continued on, digging by himself. His health and that of his
family began to decline. After two years, Michael Brennan realized
his Massachusetts Hill had become Heartbreak Hill. One of
his friends, Old Charley, found him one morning slumped down
at the entrance to his mine. “Charley,” he said, “my dream is
over. This mine has beaten me.”
The next Sunday the Brennan family missed church in Grass
Valley. Alarmed at the silence around the home, the neighbors
went to check. They broke into the house and found the whole
family dead, evidently of poison. Dorinda and the children were
sitting up in their beds, Michael was sitting almost upright in his
easy chair in the parlor, as if he had just fallen asleep. The family
was buried nearby in the city cemetery on a small rise just
across from Massachusetts Hill.
New owners purchased the mine. At the very spot where Michael
Brennan had put in his last day of digging, the new owners
set off a blast that uncovered the rich ledge of gold Brennan had
sought. One day more and his dreams would have come true!
He quit too soon!
As I read this story by Charles Crowder, “The Saga of Heartbreak
Hill,” in an airline magazine years ago, I thought of the
admonitions and encouragement of Scripture that we are to
endure. Jesus said to His disciples, “he who stands firm to the
end will be saved” (Mark 13:13). The apostle Paul said: “Run in
such a way as to get the prize” (1 Corinthians 9:24) and affirms
in his last letter that indeed, “I have finished the race” (2 Timothy
4:7). The writer of Hebrews urges discouraged and persecuted
believers not to drop out, but to “run with perseverance the race
marked out for us” (12:1).George O. Wood is general superintendent of the
Assemblies of God (USA).Until Next time! God's Grace and Peace!
