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Gold rush history
Most of the world's gold is locked deep underground--embedded in hard rock. But California gold was different--easily accessible to anyone with a few simple tools and a willingness to work hard. Also unique was the political environment.
California became a part of the United States just a few days after
Marshall's discovery; and so the gold rush came before any meaningful
government could be established. It was an unlikely intersection of
anarchy and geology. Unlike anywhere else, the gold in California was
easy to get and free for the taking.
It was free--and it was plentiful. Soon there was too much money in
California and too little of everything else. The lessons of supply and
demand were often painful. A forty-niner who earned a dollar a day back
home, could make twenty-five dollars in a day of mining--but that was
often just enough to buy dinner.
It wasn't just Sutter's gardens that were raided--by the end of 1849,
his grand empire had collapsed completely. Sutter did not have the
entrepreneurial spirit of the new Californians and he didn't have gold
fever. He wanted an agricultural empire and refused to alter his vision.
In the new California, Sutter was simply in the way. The 49ers literally
trampled his crops and tore down his fort for the building materials.
Dejected, disillusioned, he eventually left the state. The man who had
the best opportunity to capitalize on the discovery of gold--never even
tried.
Instead, California was filling up with a very different kind of
businessman--and it was filling up fast. Camps sprouted up and evolved
into ramshackle boomtowns to serve the growing population--places with
accurate names like: Hangtown, Gouge Eye, Rough and Ready, and
Whiskeytown. Places to avoid--were it not for the gold. Places that were
wild, open, free.
The class society of the east was gone and opportunity was everywhere.
It was pure freedom, and a pure free market. People who had a skill were
in demand regardless of who they were. Women, for example, who couldn't
earn much money back home, found their domestic skills had considerable
value here.
Part of the reason they could charge so much for their talents was the
fact that women were rare in the early gold rush days.
Women weren't the only ones to realize the entrepreneurial opportunities
of California. People from all walks of life quickly understood that
there was just as much money to be made serving the miners as there was
digging for gold. A steamboat operator could earn 40,000 dollars in a
single month--a chicken farmer could sell each precious egg for fifty
cents.
King of the wheeling, dealing entrepreneurs was Sam Brannan. The man who
pulled the trigger on the gold rush was expanding his sphere of
influence--and earning unheard of profits. While miners talked of gold,
Brannan shrewdly bought up carpet tacks-- every tack in California. By
cornering the market, he could extort huge profits, a technique he
executed flawlessly--over and over. But Brannan was only the first in a
long line of entrepreneurs who made their fortunes without digging for
gold.
In 1853--according to legend--this man stitched a pair of pants out of
canvas; sturdy pants that later became popular with the miners--very
popular. His name: Levi Strauss.
But during the gold rush, Strauss was best known for his prosperous dry
good business. It wasn't until 1872 that he added a critical innovation
to canvas pants, the metal rivet--a breakthrough that would change the
course of American fashion.
This New York butcher decided one day to walk to California. Eventually,
he opened a meat market in Placerville--and later took his profits to
Milwaukee, where he set up a meat processing plant. His name was Phillip
Armour, and the Armour meat packing company became one of the nation's
largest.
Armour's neighbor in Placerville, was an enterprising wheelbarrow maker
who dreamed of bigger things. After saving every dime for six years, he
left California for his home in Indiana. There, he plowed his profits
into the family wagon-making business.
The man's name was John Studebaker--and the family enterprise would go
on to build covered wagons for the Oregon-bound pioneers, and
later--automobiles.
These two businessmen also looked west and saw opportunity. Sensing the
unsettled atmosphere in California--they offered what many miners
desperately wanted: stability. The offered secure, honest banking,
transportation, even mail delivery. They were Henry Wells and William
Fargo. Their company, Wells Fargo, became a giant in the banking
industry.
The most famous celebrity of the gold rush era came to California as a
complete unknown and took a job writing for the San Francisco Call. It
wasn't long until his fanciful story about a frog jumping contest in
nearby Calaveras County thrust him into the national spotlight. His
name: Samuel Clemens--Mark Twain.
Clemens boss at the Call was also destined to become a best-selling
author, Brett Harte. Unlike Clemens, Harte wrote almost exclusively
about western characters--colorful stories about miners, bandits, and
gamblers. His tale of an orphaned baby adopted by a group of rough
miners would make him famous and rich.
For every famous success, there were a thousand smaller stories of
people who used their wits, not their shovels-- to find a fortune.
Creative entrepreneurs were everywhere--looking for a new angle--a new
way to make money, more money.
In 1848 and early 49, everyone was making money--but the party didn't
last forever. For most miners, it didn't last very long at all.
More information about the history of gold in California:
California gold history : In the early 1840s, California was a distant outpost that only a handful of Americans had seen. The sleepy port that would become San Francisco had just a few hundred residents.
California gold rush history: Most of the world's gold is locked deep underground--embedded in hard rock. But California gold was different
Gold mining changes: As the gold became more difficult to extract, profound changes in California took root
Gold rush impact on California: Although the gold in the California hills eventually ran out--the impact of the gold rush era lives on