One January day in 1848, a person named James Marshall was inspecting a noticed mill beneath
construction for his employer. Immediately he observed an uncommon rock glowing within the
overturned earth. Was this a nugget of gold?
Marshall tried to interrupt the rock with a hammer. It didnt crack, but it surely dented
like gold.
The lady who cooked for the noticed mill building crew threw the nugget into a pot of
lye. The rock boiled for a day, however it did not change color… like gold. Then the mills
owner, John Sutter, carried out a few tests. Everyone agreed: this was gold.
Where did the gold come from? The Sierra Nevada Mountains held shops of the valuable
metal. Over tens of 1000′s of years, erosion had loosened gold nuggets, and mountain
streams washed them to stream beds below. Sutters property was nestled between two
rivers and was wealthy with opportunity.
Sutter swore his staff to secrecy. With 39,000 acres of land, he had plans to build
an agricultural empire. However somehow, word trickled out. Finally news of the gold-
laced soil reached the small city of San Francisco. There a newspaper writer shouted
down the streets, Gold from the American River! Within three days of the information
arriving, 400 of the 600 settlers had left to trample Sutters land. By the tip of the 12 months,
gold prospectors traveled to California from as far as Oregon, Hawaii, Mexico, and Chile.
And around that time, phrase of the gold reached states in the East. President Polk
confirmed the discovery in December of 1848. The Gold Rush turned a national and
world phenomenon.
The prospectors of 1849 (and later) became generally known as forty-niners. Many traveled to
California by land. Since these have been pre-railroad days, individuals coming from Canada,
Mexico, and the jap United States faced a six to nine month journey. Nonetheless, at
least 32,000 actually walked to California in 1849, and about 44,000 more arrived in
1850. Others, resembling South Americans, faced an arduous journey by sea. They suffered
storms, shipwrecks, hunger and thirst, illness, and overcrowding. After that, some still
confronted mule rides by means of jungles and deserts! Nonetheless, in less than a year, about 40,000
people arrived in San Francisco from overseas.
The brand new arrivals constituted a dramatic change in Californias population. In 1848,
California had been home to roughly a hundred,000 people, most of whom have been Native
Americans. Inside two years the state inhabitants greater than doubled, and it now housed
folks from many more backgrounds.
People set up mining camps in promising areas, and named them spirited names like
Hell’s Delight and Hangtown. Some people discovered golden fortune within the California
riverbeds. Lucky forty-niners panned flakes and nuggets value a fortune.
Nevertheless, most people did not become wealthy within the Gold Rush. When gold was discovered,
the cache was often cleared rapidly by only a few. James Marshall had little success as
a miner, and he died impoverished. John Sutter, who had once owned 39,000 acres, left
California in heavy debt after miners trampled his land.
Some folks profited not from mining, but from charging miners for provides and
services. With some wealthy miners round, businesspeople could earn $2 for a pound of
sugar, or $25 for a house-cooked meal! And when the gold ran out, many miners
remained in California to kind companies too, or to farm the new states fertile valleys.
By 1856, San Francisco boasted a cosmopolitan inhabitants of over 50,000 people.
California had grow to be essentially the most thrilling state within the nation.
