Welcome to Iron Fire Gold
My name is Rich Lampright. I have been a recreational prospector since 1960 when I first picked up a gold pan to try my luck at a roadside gold-panning concession in the Black Hills of South Dakota. I found 14 flakes of gold that afternoon and put them in a specimen bottle for safe-keeping. Several days later, on a hike in the Badlands, the bottle slipped from my pocket never to be seen again. Although the loss was a huge disappointment, I was hooked forever.
​In 1969 I joined the Air Force and was stationed in California. The very next weekend I was prospecting the "Motherlode". During the following 34 years, the Air Force gave me the opportunity to prospect for gold in California, Colorado, Georgia, Australia, Philippines, Nevada, Utah, Arizona and Alaska.
I arrived at Elmendorf AFB, Alaska in the Fall of 1992 and spent my spare time during the winters in the local US Geological Survey Library researching Alaska gold placer locations. Initially, my research concentrated on the area around Anchorage. In 1995, with the support and encouragement of Steve Herschbach, part owner of Alaska Mining and Diving Supply in Anchorage, I published my first book titled "Gold Placer Deposits Near Anchorage Alaska". Buy the time I retired from the Air Force in 2004, I had accumulated a vast amount of information on gold placer deposits which has since been compiled in an additional 12 books covering the entire state of Alaska and 6 books covering the western United States.
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I now spends the winters in Utah and places south, but return to Alaska occasionally to prospect and continue with my research.