It's my time to shine! I am a member of a infamous semi-secret historical society that focuses on American western expansion, and in my chapter (chapter 1849) particularly the California gold rush.
A: 1550-1900 B: California gold rush C: California gold rush
The organization has erected thousands of monuments across the world, and it is likely you have seen one without knowing it if you are American. There are thousands of them in my home territory (Mariposa, Tuolumne, and Calaveras counties) alone. They are most commonly metal plaques embedded into boulders or stone momuments, brown metal road signs ("Point of Historical Interest" ring a bell?), and wood engravings for old buildings that still stand from the time period.
How about some history. The first momuments I had a hand in erecting was the great Hi-Oh. It is a brass plaque set in a granite boulder. The plaque itself was thought to be hundreds of years old, it describes the rock itself as the very rock Sir Francis Drake landed on the day of June the 7th, 1579, and held a symbol- the deer from the stern of the Golden Hind, Drake's ship. The plaque was found embedded in the rock underwater in the San Francisco Bay, April of 1822. No record of a specific landing spot was recorded previously. This led to suspicion that it may be a forgery. It was removed from the boulder and sent out east to Harvard for examination. From there it was passed to the Masons whom held on to it until recently, when a scientist drilled it and tested a sample of the metal. It was found to be a modern alloy that couldn't have existed more than a couple hundred years ago. It did, however, match an alloy used in a certain organization's historical momuments. One that had been screwing with the Masons, Elks, and Oddfellows for quite some time. It was returned to us by an inside agent, where we put it back in the rock, and it stays there until today. It was relocated to Mi Wuk native territory recently, where we had a big party to celebrate successfully fooling the Masons for almost 200 years.
The organization itself was founded by pioneer miners during the gold rush of 1849 and the traditions still last to this day. You can find a description of it in "The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County" written by one of our most famous members, Mark Twain. It's the short story that first earned him fame as a writer. It will also show you how redneck we are, because the event described is still being held annually today.
Man, I love local history.