Constance Perham, who displayed it in her house in New Almaden. The new museum opened in 1998. The building underwent extensive renovation from 2009 to 2010 to restore it to its configuration when it was a mine manager's residence from 1854 to 1925. It reopened in January 2011. It houses interpretive exhibits and displays on the history of the New Almaden mines and on the lives of its workers and their families. Hacienda Hotel In the mid-1800s, just a few years before the great California Gold Rush, Andres Castillera, a Mexican officer with the Artillery discovered cinnabar in New Almaden, a precious metal also known as quicksilver which bought Castillera lot of riches. As the word spread, New Almaden was thriving with miners trying to mine more cinnabar themselves. In 1848, a boarding house was constructed by the creek in New Almaden as a house for boarding for the miners. Hot meals were served in the rustic dining room downstairs. This was the first two-story lodging in California. Fire destroyed the building in 1875 but it was rebuilt and stayed in operation in this capacity until the 1930s. It was then converted into Cafe Del Rio which served New Almaden for almost 40 years. In 1992, La Foret, a high-end French restaurant opened in the building. The restaurant, still in operation, is a local landmark in San Jose and well known across the Bay Area for its fine dining New Almaden Historic District A two-teacher school was built in the 1860s on a flat near Casa Grande. Enrollment came chiefly from the Hacienda along with some children from nearby ranches. One of the oldest buildings in the district is the Carson-Perham Adobe, built between 1848 and 1850 by Mexican miners, and later the home of George Carson, the mine company bookkeeper, postmaster, telegraph operator, and Wells Fargo agent. Constance Perham lived in the adobe house for many years and established a private museum there in 1949, the collections of which were purchased in 1983 by Santa Clara County. Transportation Roads Almaden Expressway is the primary arterial road that intersects through Almaden Valley, linking it to the rest of Santa Clara Valley with connections to the West Valley Freeway (CA 85) and the Guadalupe Freeway (CA 87) Blossom Hill Road, an important artery for South San Jose and Los Gatos also passes through Almaden. Rail Until 2019, Almaden station of the