01/10/2026
There has been a lot of confusion about the Godber/Burnham, Dry Creek Mine. For those of you who donāt know me, I would like to introduce myself.
My name is Bruce Woods, I am the owner and operator of Woods Turquoise. We own the Dry Creek Mine, Also called Godber. We purchased the mine June of 1999, from Janet and Larry Everett. We purchased three claims. Blue Stone, Last Chance and Homesite #1. Larry and Janet kept Homesite. Last year we purchased the last claim from Janet Everett, Homesite.
I started mining in 1974, with Ron Hammon. He owned the Nevada Blue (Watts mine), Blue diamond, Zuni, and the Moon Glow. I also worked with Clyde and John Wright and Stan Maestretti (my cousin) at other mines, during the 70ās and 80ās. For those that know me, you know me to be honest , upstanding and old school. If I give you my word I keep it.
I also owned and operated the Nevada Blue before giving it to my uncle Phillip Williams (poncho) when we bought the Dry Creek- Godber mine. We are also a lot like my cousin Stan, we only work with family. Visits to the mine are selective and invitation only as we donāt offer mine tours.
The Godber mine also known as Dry Creek was discovered in 1932 by Bob Burton and Joe Potts who first filed claim to it under the name āLast Chanceā, adding later the āBlue Stoneā and āHomesiteā claims. Burton and Potts later sold their claims to Frank Burnham who worked it extensively and then sold the mine to Walter Godber of Los Angeles who further developed and operated the mine. Godber then leased the mine to Clyde Wright in the 70ās. After Clyde passed his son John failed to file the paperwork, and Godbersā lost the mine. Chris Rose staked the mine, later selling it to Janet and Larry Everett. Whom we purchased it from.
We have a Nevada Bureau of mine report 17 of turquoise deposits of Nevada dated 1968. It shows the Dry Creek mine also known as Godber, and all the claim names . I will attach a picture of this for your research.
As for the Valley Blue claim:
Stan Maestretti started mining the Valley Blue in the 70ās. He sold some of his turquoise to a gentleman that marketed it as Sacred Buffalo. It was never called Dry Creek, in all the years that Stan mined it. Stan would never have called the claim or rock Dry Creek as his friend Clyde Wright was mining the Dry Creek - Godber at that time and Stan had more integrity that to do that to Clyde.
Stan passed away and the family chose not to continue mining the claim.
It was only later after Stan passed, that others started to call it Dry Creek because of the popularity of the light blue. Lots of articles have been written about the Dry Creek, not all are correct. The article from Durango Silver has some of the errors, and they were contacted and they never made the corrections.
A story was told to others that Stan had someone working for him for rock. That is highly unlikely as Stan only worked with family and never let anyone run his equipment but family.
Austin is a very small town, I grew up there and was related to most of the people in this town at that time. Sadly a lot have passed on. Turquoise was a very small business and everyone knew everyone.
There has been a lot of material coming out in the last few months that is being sold as Dry Creek. This is material that was taken out of the Valley Blue, Godber/Dry Creek and other claims with out the owners consent and knowledge.
So if you bought any of this material, know that the owners of those claims did not sell it or give it to anyone. These people came up with the material in their own way and their prices reflected that.
It is likely provenance will NOT be given for the material.
When we sell, we give a certificate of authenticity for all stones.
Thank you for your time.
