ools Gold Rush

aron Von Lodge was the head of a small country known as Lilliland near Switzerland. The time was the early 1900s.

Lilliland was a very popular year-round tourist destination. The skiing was magnificent in winter, sailing on Castle Lake in summer, and hiking, camping and horseback riding in between. That is the way Baron Von Lodge liked it. All was going well and the weather was fine for all the sports and activities.

The tourist business was very competitive and other resort areas wished to have the same following that Lilliland enjoyed. In other resorts the visitors stayed typically two or three days, but in Lilliland they stayed for a week or longer because there was so much to do and all the citizens go out of their way to make sure the visitors have an enjoyable time.

It was reported to the Baron that some new people in Lilliland were small groups of men with camping gear plus extra picks and shovels. They were digging up the mountain trails and leaving the place full of holes and ditches. It was very unsightly and dangerous.

The Baron asked his chief advisor Professor Hamblin to see what was causing all this activity. It did not take the Professor long to determine that the men were in search of gold. They had heard somewhere that there was a vein of gold in the Alpine Mountains in Lilliland. In some areas it looked like a gold rush.

When the Baron heard about this he knew that something was very wrong. All the mining reports that he had received over the years said the same thing--Lilliland did not have any gold that was worth searching for. The Professor suggested that they post the mining report for everyone to see that indicated there were no significant veins of gold worth pursuing. Once the men saw the report they felt that they were duped and sent on a fool's mission to dig up the mountain trails for nothing.

The Baron asked the Professor to find out why this rumor was started and for what reason. It turned out that a competing resort owner started the rumor in order to destroy the ski trails, hiking trails, and camping sites. The Baron took immediate action to have the guilty resort owner fined for improper conduct, which it was. The matter was settled. The gold seekers felt that they had been made pawns in an effort to hurt the tourist industry in Lilliland. They were sorry and fixed all their diggings and brought their families back to vacation in Lilliland.