From the 1850's until 1893, the Gamble Building housed a Wells Fargo Office.

When the gold mining town of Big Oak Flat burned in 1863, only two buildings survived: the Gamble Building and the Odd Fellows Hall.

Mining camps started as clusters of tents and other makeshift shelters. If the mine was productive, wooden buildings were erected and a town was born.

Conflagrations were a recurring curse. Often entire town were repeatedly destroyed by fire. Stonemasons, especially Italian immigarnts from Liguria, began building "fire proof" banks and stores of stone or brick with iron doors and iron window shutters to protect the contents form fire.

Many of these stone buildings survive. Some of them, such as the Butte Store, are the sole reminders of a lost mining town.

Some of these buildings are:

• Butte Store in Amador County
• Compere Store in Murphys
• Fountain & Tallman Soda Works in Placerville
• Gamble Building in Big Oak Flat
• Italian Store in Douglas Flat
• Nevada Brewery in Nevada City
• Old Segale Building in Murphys
• Pearson Soda Works in Placerville
• Valente Building in Murphys