Describe how mining boomtowns formed and often became lawless, and explain why many later became ghost towns.
Wherever a promising strike happened, a boomtown could spring up almost overnight -- tents and wooden buildings crowding in within weeks, complete with saloons, gambling halls, and general stores. Towns like Placerville (once nicknamed "Hangtown"), Columbia, Sonora, and Nevada City grew this way. With so many people arriving faster than any real government could organize, formal law enforcement and courts were often scarce in the early camps.
Miners frequently created their own informal rules, sometimes called miners' codes, especially to punish claim-jumping -- stealing someone else's already-claimed mining spot, considered one of the worst offenses a miner could commit. Without much formal law, punishment could be swift and rough, sometimes carried out by vigilante groups rather than courts. Fires, often started by candles or lanterns in tightly packed wooden buildings, could burn a boomtown down in a single night. And when a strike ran dry, a boomtown's population could vanish almost as fast as it arrived, leaving behind what geographers and historians simply call a ghost town.
Mastery looks like: They can describe how a boomtown formed, name one real example, and explain why some became ghost towns.
Common stumbles: Confusing lawlessness with total chaos (miners often did create their own working rules); missing why fires spread so easily in these towns.