Fun Gold Rush Old West Party Ideas

Let guests step back in time with an Old West Gold Rush mining party. This can be a fun theme whether your party is for adults, kids, or both. Below are a variety of ideas you can incorporate to celebrate the past while having a good time in the present.

Party Invitations

Guests should be invited to your party 2 weeks in advance. This gives them time to keep the date open and get ready for the party. If sending out paper or digital invitations, a cool one to use is a wanted poster.

Include the occasion for the party, date, time, and location. You'll also want to ask guests to RSVP so you can get a proper head count to prepare for the occasion.

For a Gold Rush party, it would be fun to ask your guests to come in costume. If you plan to, be sure to include that on your invitation. I would also suggest that you ask guests if they have any food allergies to make sure you have food that is safe for everyone to eat.

Decorations

Gold is the color for this party, and you can use this color for balloons, your tablecloth, and table wear.

To decorate the table, suggested ideas include fake gold bricks, miniature gold mining tools, fake gold nuggets, and Old West-style bandanas.

Consider setting up a separate table for beverages and hang a sign that says saloon in front, as saloons were very popular then. If possible, have someone dress up like an Old West bartender to serve guests their drinks.

Gold Rush Costumes

A typical outfit for a miner to wear was trousers with a long-sleeved shirt, boots, and a hat to protect him from the sun. Of course, miners weren't the only people around during the Gold Rush. Guest could also dress as:

• Cowboys

• Native Americans

• Saloon gals

• Sheriffs

• Prairie women

• Medicine men

• Entertainers

It was pretty common for women to wear boots. Young gals wore their hair down while women wore their hair up. Accessories for both men and women were limited unless you were wealthy or an entertainer.

Gold Rush Party Food

There wasn't much of a variety of food available to the early gold miners. Some of the most common foods were beans, salted pork, sourdough bread, and canned food. For a splurge, there was Hangtown Fry, a dish that originated in what is now Placerville, CA. It's an omelet with bacon and oysters.

Of course, the above is probably not something you would want to serve party goers, so I suggest having a barbecue instead. For kids, hamburgers and hot dogs should be well received. For adults, some suggested foods include:

• Sausage

• Roasted potatoes

• Cole slaw

• Steak

• Cowboy pasta salad

• Corn on the cob

• Ribs

• Beans

• Biscuits

• Potato salad

Pie would be nice for dessert. Popular pies of the time include dried apple and berry pies. 

Party Drinks

If you're looking to serve an alcohol free drink, then consider sarsaparilla, which was a popular drink of the Gold Rush times. It tastes similar to root beer. You might also want to have some coffee, as it was a popular drink of choice when someone didn't want alcohol.

If you want to serve alcohol, beer and whiskey were two of the most popular drinks that were served. Should you want to get a little fancier and serve a cocktail, try Pisco punch. It's a grape brandy drink. Here's a recipe:

• 2 oz. Pisco

• 1 oz. pineapple syrup

• 1 oz. lemon juice

Combine ingredients into a cocktail shaker and shake. Pour over ice. Add a pineapple wedge for garnish.

Party Activities

If the party is for kids, then gold panning is a must! This can be put together pretty easily. You'll need a container. You could use a plastic trough, plastic flower bed, or even a small kiddie pool.

Put sand inside your container. Next, add your "gold" and mix it in with the sand. This could be in the form of pyrite (which is fool's gold), or an inexpensive way to add "gold" is to get some tiny rocks and spray paint them gold. Finally, add water.

For your gold pans, aluminum pie tins would work perfectly.

Some miners liked to use burros to carry their supplies. You can play off of this idea by playing Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

If the party is outside, play horseshoes, which was popular back in the day.

If the party is for adults, a poker game would be entertaining, as miners loved to gamble.

Horseshoe Craft

Most people enjoy doing crafts, and what's nice about making a craft is that your guests can bring their crafts home with them. A horseshoe craft is pretty easy to make. You'll need some wooden craft horseshoe blanks to start. Besides having one for each guest, I suggest you keep a few extra on hand in case someone makes a mistake and wants to start over.

You'll also need some decorating supplies such as paint, crayons, glitter, stickers, colored sand, sequins, or anything else that you feel your guests would have fun decorating with.

I suggest you do this craft towards the beginning of your party so the horseshoes have time to dry.

Gold Rush Trivia Game

How much do your guests really know about the Gold Rush? Play a trivia game to find out who knows their stuff. Some sample questions and answers include:

• What year was gold discovered in California? (1848)

• Who discovered gold in California? (James Marshall)

• What brand of jeans was developed during the Gold Rush? (Levi's)

• What nickname was given to miners? (49ers)

• What famous author tried his luck at finding gold, but didn't get rich? (Mark Twain)

• Where was gold discovered in California? (Sutter's Mill)

• Was California a state at the start of the Gold Rush? (No)

• Who was President during the Gold Rush? (James K. Polk)

• What is the name of the city today where gold was found? (Coloma)

• Overall, who made more money, miners or merchants? (Merchants)

• Which country migrated the most to the US during the Gold Rush? (China)

• What year did the Gold Rush end? (1855)

Gold Rush Music

Quite a few songs were written during the Gold Rush days, although there are no original recordings as the equipment hadn't been invented yet. I have one for you in the video above if you would like to hear it. However, the songs lived on, and below is a list of popular ones for the time. (Don't worry if you haven't heard of many of them. They were way before your time!)

• "The Days of '49"

• "Betsy from Pike"

• "Frontier Waltz"

• "Clementine"

• "Sacramento"

• "The Gambler"

• "Oh California"

• "Sacramento Gals"

• "Joe Bower"

Goodie Bags

It's a nice idea to give guests (particularly children) a goodie bag to take home with them. It's a nice souvenir of your party. Some suggested items to put in include chocolate gold coins, miniature bottles of fool's gold, beef jerky, fake old west tattoos, bandanas, and guitar key chains.

Party Ideas

You now have some basic ideas of how to throw an entertaining and memorable party. Feel free to use any of the ideas above, but be sure to use your own imagination as well. Have a great party!