Gold Panning in Boston, MA. You can get a gold pan at Walmart. That and a shovel, a small 3-legged chair you can put in water and you are all set. Plus, a Q-tip and a pill bottle (clear) with some water in it.
You take the shovel, dig from the side of a stream, put a hunk of dirt in your pan, and start swishing it around–first get the mud out, then the larger rocks, then all the other pebbles and eventually you will get to back dirt — hematite–and the gold (it will be very tiny because gold in Massachusetts is probably glacial) will pop up. You then take the Q-tip put it on the gold and put it into your pill bottle. Amazing fun on a hot day. You won’t get rich, but you will have a good time.
Supposedly, Western MA has more gold than the rest of the state. Look for streams with good water flow and vertical drop and broken bedrock that will provide a concentrating effect. Work the cracks and crevices and clean as good as possible. Break the bedrock apart and clean all gravel and material that has collected in the cracks and under the bedrock you could break. If there is cracked or broken bedrock above the waterline up on the banks be sure to clean them as they will fill during flood stage.
There is also a national gold propspectors group- GPAA –Gold Prospectors Assoc. of America
There are also Gold and Treasure Expos but most of them are on the West Coast of the US (more gold there).
