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The second-largest gold nugget in the world was found in Ballarat in the Red Hill Mine which is recreated in Sovereign Hill. The Welcome Nugget weighed 69 kg,(2,200 ounces) and comprised 99.2% pure gold, valued at about 10,596 pounds when found, and worth over US$3 million in gold now, or far more as a specimen.
Several businesses and attractions have capitalised on Ballarat's gold mining history. They include Kryal Castle (1972), "Gold Rush Mini Golf" (2002) featuring the "Big Miner" (2006) one of Australia's big things (although the original proposal appeared larger and for the miner to hold the Eureka Flag) [129] at Ballarat's eastern entrance.
The gold rush is reflected in the architecture of Victorian gold-boom cities like Melbourne, Castlemaine, Ballarat, Bendigo and Ararat. Ballarat today has Sovereign Hill—a 60-acre (24 ha) recreation of a gold rush town—as well as the Gold Museum. Bendigo has a large operating gold mine system which also functions as a tourist attraction.
[200] [201] [202] The gold rush which followed has been argued to be the most important in Queensland's gold-mining history. [203] This was a reef-mining area with only a small amount of alluvial gold., [204] and as a result received negative reviews from miners who wanted easier pickings. [205]
Ballarat's best-known tourist destination, Sovereign Hill, was opened in November 1970 as an open-air museum set in the gold rush period. Since 1992, in commemoration of the Eureka Stockade, Sovereign Hill has featured a 90-minute son et lumière "Blood Under the Southern Cross", a sound and light show attraction played under the night skies.
Ballarat East is a suburb of Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. From 1857 until 1921 the suburb had its own council (see below). The suburb covers a large area east of the city centre. It is the oldest urban area in Ballarat and was the site of many goldmines, as well as of the Eureka Rebellion.
During the first years of the Victorian gold rush, Canadian Gully [a] became one of the most prominent diggings on the Ballarat goldfields. January 1853 marked the discoveries of three gold nuggets each weighing over 1,000 ounces (28 kg) — including the Canadian, then the largest recorded nugget ever — and brought a gold rush to Ballarat greater than the original rush at Golden Point in 1851.
Replica horse-powered Chilean Mill at Sovereign Hill open-air museum in Ballarat. The Chilean mill was a machine used on gold fields in an early period of gold mining. The machine was composed of two rotating wheels that would revolve over a pan filled with gold-bearing rocks.