gold rush

Mining migration fever

A gold rush is a rapid migration of people to a region where gold has been discovered: The California gold rush transformed San Francisco from a small settlement into a boomtown.

The term extends to any frenzied pursuit of sudden wealth or opportunity: the dot-com gold rush of the late 1990s. (Capitalized Gold Rush typically refers to specific historical events, especially California 1848–1855.)

fever

mania

Intense, consuming obsession

frenzyViolent mental agitation
speculationUnproven theorizing or risky investment
hysteriaUncontrollable emotional excess

obsession · craze · stampede · excitement · desperation · gambling · greed · delirium · bonanza · jackpot

metaphorical

dot-com

Web-based commercial enterprise

startupNew business enterprise
boomLoud deep sound
opportunityFavorable circumstance for advancement

land grab · speculation · bubble

Categories

Northern frontiertundra, taiga, permafrost, Arctic, subarctic
economic historystock market crash, Industrial Revolution, trade routes, Great Depression, Silk Road
California historystatehood, Spanish colonization, Spanish mission, Sutter's Mill, railroad expansion
commodity boomoil boom, mining boom, energy boom
gold miningpan, panning, nuggets, sluice box, prospector
mountain town historymining boom, silver mining, ghost towns, boom and bust, prospectors

Opposites

economic activity pattern

gold rusheconomic depression

Sustained economic contraction

recession · market collapse · bust · economic decline · downturn

extraction methodology

gold rushindustrial mining

Large-scale mineral extraction operations

population movement dynamics

gold rushmass exodus

Large-scale collective departure

exodus · depopulation · abandonment · outmigration · ghost town

Family

rush, gold, golden, rushed, rushing, rushes, gilded, gilding, rusher

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