goldfields

I have a couple of talks scheduled for September, so if you are in the neighborhood, I hope you will come and say, “Hi!”

On Saturday, September 21st I will be speaking at the Butte County Historical Society about my latest book, Alvin Coffey: The True Story of an African-American Forty-Niner. The talk is at 1:00 p.m. and refreshments will be served. The BCHS Museum is at the corner of Baldwin and Spencer Avenues in Oroville. Their phone number is 530-533-9418. Books will be available for purchase.

Then the next day, Sunday September 22nd, at 2:00 p.m., I will be at the lovely Kelly-Griggs House Museum in Red Bluff. Again the topic will be Alvin Coffey, who was a resident of Tehama County. I am looking forward to visiting the Kelly-Griggs House again — it’s been a few years. It is a beautiful classic Victorian-era home with a nice variety of displays.

In both cases, my talk will not be just about Alvin, but also the history of black slavery in California. Maybe you didn’t know that black slavery existed in California, but it did, and was the subject of great contention in California from the Gold Rush to the Civil War.

Alvin’s story is an inspiring one of determination and the love of freedom. When I first heard about it, I knew I had to tell his story. Steve Ferchaud did a great job with the illustrations.

I really enjoy talking to groups, whether it be adult history enthusiasts or school classes. It’s a chance to get away from the desk and out in the world of people of all ages who are curious about our local history. If you need a speaker, contact me at goldfieldsbooksca@gmail.com. I’d love to talk to you.

What’s new?

I took a trip to England in June and did absolutely nothing related to California history. I hiked the ancient Ridgeway trail and spent a few days in London. Here is a picture of my crew in Avebury, before the weather turned warm and sunny.

I came back from the UK and promptly came down with a mild case of COVID, my first. I got over that pretty quickly.

I walked by Bidwell Mansion today. As you can see from these photos, it is completely engulfed in scaffolding. For information about the renovation project, look at this State Parks page. The roof will be replaced, the balusters and urns and other woodwork will be evaluated and repaired if necessary, and the mansion will be repainted inside and out.

A year ago I published a post on this blog about a painting of Bidwell Mansion by John Frederick Holtzman. If you are interested to know more about the artist, there is an article about him (and also Augustus Koch), by John Rudderow and Deana Glatz, in the Summer 2024 issue of the Butte County Historical Society Diggin’s.

Holtzman lived in a number of northern California communities, from Mokelumne Hill to Grass Valley to Santa Cruz. He only spent a couple of years in Chico. It must not have been easy to make a living as an artist, even if he also painted houses and carriages.

I hope your summer is going well. Stay cool and read history!

Dear Friends,

I have enjoyed writing this blog for the past 13 years, every since my first book came out. Four more books and 1231 blog posts later, it’s time for me to take a break. I have a big project that I am working on, and I want to devote my time and thinking to it. I also have some summer travel plans coming up.

I will have the occasional post here, when something strikes my fancy, so I won’t disappear entirely. For instance, I want to invite you all to the Paradise Chocolate Fest. I will be in the All About Books section, together with friends from ANCHR and all our many books. Admission to the entire fun (and chocolate) – filled festival is only $5. Music, games, artisans, food, and so much chocolate. I hope I’ll see you there. Stop by our table and say “Hi!”

When my project gets closer to finalization, I’ll let you in on it. But for now I am saying “Adios.”

Keep on riding down the History Trail!

Best regards and wishes — Nancy

For many pioneers coming to California, Johnson’s Ranch was the end of the trail. I have written about it here and here. It is on private land and threatened by development.

I am hopeful that Johnson’s Ranch will get the recognition and preservation that it deserves. You can read about it in this article from the San Francisco Chronicle.

https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/johnsons-ranch-historic-stop-california-trail-19267765.php

I came across this story when looking through clippings of a column called “Off the Record” which appeared in the Chico Record during the 1940s. It was written by Mayor Paul Roberts, who was never an official mayor of anything, but was known as the “Mayor of Sandy Gulch,” for his prominence in the Sandy Gulch neighborhood, where he ran a grocery store. Sandy Gulch is the waterway now known in Chico as Lindo Channel.

Paul Roberts was a great collector of stories. He not only relayed old tales of Chico in his column “Off the Record,” but also collected the reminiscences of George Moses Gray, John Bidwell’s orchard foreman, and published them in his own weekly Sandy Gulch News.

This story appeared on June 6, 1947. Paul Roberts credits it to Joe Kennedy, Annie Bidwell’s nephew, who was well-acquainted with the Bidwells and their home. Joe Kennedy worked as a pharmacist at Lee’s Pharmacy.

As most of us know, ever since he married Annie Kennedy, John Bidwell was a staunch prohibitionist. Before he met Annie, he grew wine grapes and employed a wine maker. But he tore out all the wine grapevines and after his marriage only grew table and raisin grapes. According to Roberts:

The General was fond of eating and had the finest of food prepared by the best of cooks. He favored all kinds of fruits, vegetables and melons, but he liked desserts too, one of them being plum pudding with wine sauce. But when he turned prohib he banished the wine from the table and from the kitchen, and when it came time for plum pudding he told the cook to make the wine sauce from grape juice, it was just as good!

The cook tried her best with grape juice. She made several batches of wine sauce with juice but they were all failures. They just didn’t have the zing that real wine gives the sauce. What to do?

Time was getting short, the General would be home soon, and no wine sauce! Joe Kennedy came home to the Mansion about that time and the cook enticed him out to the kitchen, where she whispered to him about the grape juice failures.

Well, Joe was always practical, so he hurried back to the drug store and returned soon to smuggle in a gallon of fine claret wine, part of which helped produce that very important wine sauce and the rest was hidden away for future wine sauces.

Well, as they say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating.

The meal was served and at last came the plum pudding – with wine sauce. The General tasted it, tasted it again, smacked his lips and called across the table to his wife:“See there, Annie? Wine sauce from grape juice – just as good as any sauce ever made from wine!”

Joe Kennedy, seated at the dinner table, had to keep a straight face. So did the cook and the maid waiting table. And the General? “The General never knew that he enjoyed wine sauce that time and many another time made from grape juice which was grape juice once – before something happened to it!”

I had hopes of going to Texas to see the total solar eclipse on April 8th, but plans fell through and clouds are predicted for Texas next Monday. So no eclipse for me. But if you had been here in California in 1889, you could stay home and enjoy viewing an eclipse in your own backyard.

In 1889 there was no better place to observe the solar eclipse than Chico. Note the blue line.

John Bidwell recorded the eclipse in his diary:

Tues., January l.  Professors Pearson, Payne & Wilson, astronomers here to observe the total eclipse of the sun > Mansion. Events: Great total solar eclipse. The Astronomers had a very fair view of same. Weather: Fair some haze or thin clouds – air cold and raw.

Astronomers from around the nation flocked to northern California and Nevada to observe the eclipse. The Chico Daily Enterprise reported:

The party of observers from Carleton College, Northfield, Minnesota, were stationed in this town on a fine, open piece of ground on the ranch of General Bidwell. Professor Payne was in charge of the 2-inch zenith telescope, used for accurate determination of the times of contact of the moon with the sun, and for the study of the corona of the sun during totality. Professors Pearson and Wilson were in charge of the 6-inch reflecting telescope and the various cameras used for photographic purposes. . . .

The close of totality was as startling and pleasing as the beginning was depressing. The sense of awe and of being in the presence of an uncanny event cannot be described.

As the eclipse approached totality flocks of quail were observed flying to roost, and later came the crowing of cocks, while the sounds which came from the Indian camp should have been heard to be appreciated.

The Enterprise also included this little item. I wonder if this would work on modern observers.

If you miss this year’s solar eclipse, stick around. Northern California will see another one on August 12, 2045.

If you enjoy California history of all kinds (and who doesn’t?), sign up for the California Corner newsletter from the History Room at the California State Library. You’ll get a quarterly newsletter sent to your email box, packed full of photos, stories, and various tidbits of California lore.

To sign up, go to the California State Library mailing list page at https://www.library.ca.gov/mailing-lists/ There’s a slew of newsletters there, and maybe you are also interested in some of them. California Corner is the last one on the list.

The first edition of the newsletter includes announcements of upcoming events, a welcome to new librarians (there’s a job I would have liked!), a feature on California authors, a fun item in “Discoveries in the Stacks” on the Gingerbread Man cookbook, and this featured photo of a sassy chicken. She looks like a fashion model on the catwalk. Or should that be henwalk?

The California State Library has a Facebook page and it is worth checking out too. There can never be too many ways to get your California history fix!