Any town that once had a giant shamrock painted smack dab on the center of Main Street can't be all bad. Such a place is Murphys.
About ten miles from Angels Camp on Highway 4 is the appealing, tree-shaded burg of Murphys.

The town founders - John and Daniel Murphy - came to California before the Gold Rush in 1844. However, as did others, they turned to prospecting following Marshall's gold discovery at Coloma. in 1848. They struck out from the Angels Camp area in 1848 and came upon an already established mining camp at Coyote Creek. The camp soon came to be called Murphy's New Diggins, later Murphys Camp, and finally, just plain ol' Murphys.

Murphys was rich ground. So rich, in fact, that when John Murphy left town for good in 1849, he took with him with approximately $2 million in gold.

By 1850, the city population had crested one thousand. By the mid-1850s, when thorny water supply problems had been resolved through the construction of an aqueduct, the population soared to several thousand. At its peak, Murphys had more than five hundred wooden buildings, eight saloons, a bowling alley, dance halls, bordellos, blacksmiths, a livery stable, banks, and churches. It also suffered the fate of so many Gold Country towns - it burnt several times. In 1859, almost the entire business district was destroyed in a fifteen-minute conflagration. Today the population hovers around two thousand.

The crown jewel of downtown is the Murphys Hotel. Festooned with iron shutters and built of stone in classic Mother Lode style in 1860, the hotel has registered many celebrities. Among these are Mark Twain, U.S. Grant, Henry Ward Beecher, Horatio Alger, J. Pierpont Morgan, and Sir Thomas Lipton. Even Black Bart spent a night. These famous names can be seen scribbled on the hotel ledgers that are displayed in the lobby. It also features an old-fashioned saloon - one of the best and most authentic in the Gold Country.

Several other historic structures dot Murphys' Main Street. Most date from the Gold Rush era and include the Thorpe Bakery, the Traver Building, and the old Murphys Jail.

A short walk from the Murphys Hotel is the tiny white childhood home of Dr. Albert A. Michelson, the first American to win the Nobel Prize in Physics for his pioneering work in determining the speed of light.

Oh … and the giant shamrock? Annually on St. Patrick's Day, Murphys hosts a street fair called "Murphys Irish Days" - the shamrock was decoration.