goldfields

Continuing George McKinstry Jr’s letter to Edward Kern, December 1851:

Louis Keseberg

Old Louis Keseberg,* the Donner Party Man-Eater, has made a fortune and is now running a restaurant on K street in Sacramento City. I would like to board there, I wouldn’t.

Pierson B. Reading** is on his farm raising wheat and pumpkins in abundance – I camped on his rancho some six weeks last summer. He was the Whig candidate for Governor but could not make it. It was said his friendship with Captain Sutter cost him the Squatter votes. He has been wounded twice in Bear-Hunts since you left—shot in the hand two years ago and broke his leg badly two months ago. Next time it will be his head if he doesn’t quit. He plans to go to Philadelphia on the 1^st of April next and marry; about time I think. . .

Old Snyder and Sam Hensley*** both married. Bidwell too damn prosperous to mention.

After all the death and disaster that befell the Sutter’s Fort “Old Guard” it is refreshing to hear McKinstry say “Bidwell too damn prosperous to mention.” At least someone was successful.

Sam Norris has made two or three hundred thousand, but is reputed hard up and thought to be busted. Sam Brannan, ditto. In fact I could fill up a foolscap sheet with the names of the busted Old Guard in this community, including your humble servant. I purchased the Chico Rancho of old William Dickey, who went to the States or Ireland—I don’t know where the hell he is. Old John Yates**** went to England. Sam Neal† is on his farm; he has built a large frame house and still loves horses—still rides the little grey.

Dr. Bates and his brother made a snug fortune—lost it—gone to practicing again. Old Nicolaus Altgeier made a city on his farm. The city blew up and I think the explosion bent him some.

*So much has been written on the Donner Party disaster that I have never thought I needed to cover it. Whether or not Keseberg was a murderer or a cannibal is still debated.

Pierson B. Reading

**Pierson B. Reading came to California in 1844 as part of the Chiles-Walker Party. He owned Rancho Buena Ventura at the site of present-day Redding. (Which is named after him even though the railroad changed the spelling.)

***Samuel Hensley came to California with the same group as Reading. Both men were close friends with John Bidwell, and Hensley’s grant, Rancho Aguas Nieves, lay just south and east of Rancho Chico.

****John Yates was an English sailor who came to California in 1842. In 1845 he was located on Rancho Chico with Dickey. Later he owned Yates Ranch, a few miles south of Oroville.

†Someday I need to write about Sam Neal. His ranch was south of Rancho Chico, where Neal Road is today.

Here is a picture of Sam Neal — who looks like he is being played by Clint Eastwood.

One of the most entertaining letters on California history that I have seen is one written by George McKinstry Jr. to Edward Kern in December 1851. Kern was John C. Fremont’s cartographer and artist on his expedition to California in 1846. McKinstry and Kern had known each other at Sutter’s Fort, but Kern returned to the United States with Fremont at the end of the Mexican War. He never came back to California. In spite of his short stay, the Kern River and Kern County are named for him.

George McKinstry Jr. in 1880

McKinstry, who had moved on to San Diego, gives Kern updates on long list of men they had known at Sutter’s Fort. It is astonishing how many of these men are no longer in the land of the living. I don’t recognize all these names, but I will give notes on a few that I do know, and links to ones that I have written about.

Since you left this country a most astonishing change has taken place. The new Yankees would say for the better, but not we old fellows from Captain Sutter down to old Bray!*. . . Times are not what they “useter was.”

The old Sacramento crowd are much scattered by death and disaster since you left. William Daylor by cholera; Jared Sheldon shot in a row with miners; Perry McCoon by a fall from his horse; Sebastian Keyser** drowned; Little Bill Johnson*** – x – Kin Sabe? Captain “Luce” missing in the mountains; Olimpio, Sutter’s Indian messenger, shot by miners; Old Thomas Hardy, rum; John Sinclair, cholera; William E. Shannon, cholera; old William Knight,**** rum as expected; Charley Heath, rum and missing; Bob Ridley,† fever I think; and others too numerous to set down.

Our good friend Captain John Sutter has fitted up the Hock Rancho in superb style but I regret to say his reign seems smashed to flinders; old Theodore Cordua, tambien; Daylor and Sheldon estates said to be insolvent; our old and particular crony, John L. Schwartz,‡ still inhabits the Fishing Rancheria and has finally built that two-story house to escape the mosquitoes which he talked about so much. God know how he stands the pressure; he goes it, though, more than ever on the rum.

Old Kitnor is Captain Sutter’s mayordomo at Hock – he made a fortune and went bust; William A. Liedesdorff, dead; old Eliab Grimes, dead; Jack Fuller, ditto – also Allen Montgomery. Montgomery’s widow married the man who called himself Talbot H. Green, formerly with Larkin at Monterey and afterwards W. D. M. Howard’s partner in San Francisco. His real name was found to be Paul Geddes some time back, a bank robber from the United States. He departed to clear up his character, which was the last seen of him.

And there is much more — so stay tuned!

*Bray – Irish immigrant in the Stevens party of 1844.

**Sebastian Keyser – an Austrian trapper who came overland with Sutter. He was the recipient of the Llano Seco grant and later ran a ferry on the Cosumnes River, where he drowned in 1850.

***Bill Johnson – owner of Johnson’s Ranch on the immigrant trail. Bancroft notes he either died or went to the Sandwich Isles. If McKinstry knew anything, de’s not saying.

****William Knight – for whom Knight’s Landing is named.

†Bob Ridley – managed Fort Ross for Sutter before Bidwell took over the task.

‡Schwartz – member of the 1841 Bidwell-Bartleson Party, who had a grant on the Sacramento River where he established a fishing station.

Often when I am looking for a particular story in an old newspaper, I don’t find what I want, but something else catches my eye. This time it was the Red Bluff Beacon for May 11, 1859. I was looking for an item on Peter Lassen, but instead I cam across this verse promoting Oppenheim’s Dry Good Store, which was moving to “new diggings.”

M. OPPENHEIM has just returned from San Francisco with an extensive and varied stock of Fine and Fancy Dry Goods; probably the largest stock of this description of goods ever brought to this place.

Oh Ladies! all attention, pray,
Give ear unto my strain;
And as you walk about so gay,
To call on be but deign.
For though a lady’s toilet is
Composed of things a heap,
You’ll find them all within my store,
Best quality and cheap.

A lady’s dress will oft wear out,
No doubt to her great bother.
But now she need no longer pout,
When cheap she’ll get another.
From hooks and eyes to Eugenie Hoops,
All things I have in store,
So low that all who buy, confess
They ne’er bought like before.

Then come and buy, at prices low,
My goods are fast a-selling;
But buy, or not, the goods I’ll show,
You’ll may be buy, no telling.
But remember that my prices are
But down to suit the times;
And all the ladies wants can now be filled
At Mr. M. Oppenheim’s.

At present my store is next door to Pierce, Church & Co’s. On and after the 20^th inst., I will be found next door to Markwitz’s tin shop, on the west side of Main Street. M. OPPENHEIM  Red Bluff, May 11 1859

Empress Eugenie in 1860, wearing the fashionable Eugenie hoop skirt. “Everybody buys ’em now.”

Note his mention of Eugenie Hoops, so named because the Empress Eugenie, wife of Napoleon III, popularized them in Europe. Hoop skirts were becoming fashionable in the mid-1850s and ladies in Red Bluff probably weren’t wearing such things quite yet. But they would want to be en vogue, and they could get what they needed at Mr. Oppenheim’s.

The young naturalist at work

It is a tradition in our family to visit Table Mountain here in Butte County at least once in the spring, and I never feel that once is enough. Today was the day for our first visit — a perfect sunny day for it, and we are expecting rain most of the rest of the week. Rain is great for the flowers, but sunshine is best for viewing.

My love of wildflowers is the source of the name of this blog. Goldfields (Lasthenia) carpets the hillsides of Table Mountain, especially near the vernal pools.  Wildflowers plus California history — what a great combination.

Goldfields, and a few sky lupine

Kellogg’s monkeyflower

Today we saw plenty of lupines, frying pans (a smaller version of California poppies), goldfields, yellow carpet, and purple owl’s clover. The bluedicks and bird’s eye gilia were just getting started. We also spotted meadowfoam, Douglas violets, oakwoods violets, yellow seep monkeyflower, Kellogg’s monkeyflower, popcorn flower, larkspur, redmaids, volcanic onion and bitterroot. The season for wildflower viewing will continue for about a month.

Owl’s Clover

Get yourself a copy of Wildflowers of Table Mountain, by Albin Bills and Samantha Mackey, and go! You will be glad you did. (The book is a wonderful guide, and locally available at many book outlets.) Photography cannot do justice to the streams, the waterfalls, and the California blue and gold wildflowers of Table Mountain.

If you like history (and you must since you are reading this blog), The History Blog is a great place to get your daily history fix.

“Livius Drusus,” the editor of the blog, faithfully posts a history news item every day of the year, a schedule very few bloggers can boast of, myself included. Every day it is something different: the discovery of an Anglo-Saxon coin hoard, or the excavation of a centurion’s villa under a Metro station, or the restoration of a Renaissance painting. Here are two good recent ones:

Signed portrait of Harriet Tubman, c. 1868

Did you know that there is a photograph of Harriet Tubman as a young woman? It was discovered in an album last year, and the Library of Congress quickly digitized the entire album so that everyone could take a look. I had never seen a photo of her that wasn’t taken in old age. The History Blog reported on it when it was first discovered and the album went up for auction, and again this month went the digitization became available.

Harriet Tubman was in her mid-forties when this portrait was taken, so she is not really a young woman, but it is so much earlier than the other portraits we have seen, that it seems young.

Are you the kind of person who likes to quilt? (I quilt occasionally.) Would you spend more than 20 years on one quilt? (I don’t have that kind of stamina.) Adeline Harris spent eleven years collecting signatures from famous people of her day, and even longer sewing the blocks that incorporate the signatures. Her quilt is a who’s who of 19th century America, with the autographs of presidents, generals, authors, clergymen, scientists, actors, and many more — 360 signatures in all.

Detail from quilt, with the autograph of Abraham Lincoln in center

She meticulously sewed the signature scraps to two other pieces of silk, to make what is called a “tumbling block” pattern. The assembled blocks give the optical illusion of stacked cubes. It is a tour de force of quilting. The quilt was kept in pristine condition by her family for 140 years, and now belongs to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

These are just two entries at The History Blog that fascinated me, but really, the blog is a treat every day. Check it out!

Dow devoted not one, but two chapters of A Tour in America to General Bidwell’s Rancho Chico. His next chapter is about “A Fruit Orchard of 1000 Acres.”

The 1000 acres of orchard and vineyard are not all in one block, but grouped around a number of the homesteads in different parts of the property. One homestead has its apple and pear orchard, another its almond orchard, and so on, a system which enables the main work of fruit-gathering to Be conducted at the various centres in turn.

He says that irrigation is available but generally not used in the orchards, which surprised me. Maybe my fruit trees could get along with less water than I give them. I worry that they will dry up and blow away over the long hot valley summer. Back in the day, irrigation was mainly used for the nursery and the vegetable garden.

Dow tallies 12,000 peach trees, 5000 plums, 3000 apples, 3000 apricots, 2000 pears and 1600 cherries, and also give their yields for 1881 (980,000 lbs. of peaches!) What did Bidwell do with all this fruit?

The only large towns in the state available as markets are San Francisco (with less than 300,000 inhabitants) and Sacramento (with 26,000) while, as these cities have extensive areas of fruit gardens in their immediate vicinity, much of the supply from Chico must be sent to the more distant centres of population. A quantity of green fruit is sent by rail to cities in the eastern states, reaching as far as Chicago, New York, and New Orleans, thousands of miles from Chico, while the canning establishment puts the surplus in a condition to be transported to any part of the world.

It’s no wonder General Bidwell wanted to build the Humboldt Road to the mines of Nevada and Idaho. He needed markets for his surplus produce.

Dow also tells us the cost of labor: “The cheapest labour in the country costs 4s. 2d. per day, this amount being paid to Chinese, and to women and girls in canning factories, while white men receive from 6s. to 8s. 6d. a day.”

And how much was an Australian shilling worth in 1883? According to my trusty web pal, Measuring Worth, one shilling was worth $5.60 Australian dollars today, which is $4.40 American. So a white male laborer was making about $4 a day on Rancho Chico.

But wait! There’s more. Measuring Worth always has a caveat, as follows:

This may not be the best answer. The best measure of the relative value over time depends on if you are interested in comparing the cost or value of a Commodity, Income or Wealth, or a Project. If you want to compare the value of a £0 1s 0d Commodity in 1883 there are three choices. In 2016 the relative:
real price of that commodity is $5.60
labour value of that commodity is $41.64 (using average weekly earnings)
income value of that commodity is $41.66

And much more, which I would need a degree in Economics to understand.

Peach packing in the orchard. Note the age of the workers. If it weren’t for Social Security, that would be me.

The fresh fruit which is sent to market is gathered and placed in small boxes in the orchard, the fruit being graded or assorted to some extent upon the spot. A light waggon gathers up the boxes and takes them to the fruit-house, where they are evenly filled and closed up ready for transportation to the railway station, about half a mile distant. Fruit intended for such distant markets is packed in a special way. Each pear or plum is wrapped in a piece of paper before being placed in the box ; a Chinaman, at a dollar a day, being very expert at this kind of work.

So it could be that 4 shillings a day was more like $1 US, which is in line with average wages in the U.S. in 1880, according to another website.

Much of the fruit was dried, and a lot of the apple crop was turned into vinegar. Dow explains the process. Anyone wishing to set up a similar operation today could get quite a bit of information from reading Dow’s Tour in America. Dow has this to say about grapes, wine, and raisins:

General Bidwell formerly made wine, but now raisin-making varieties of grapes are being substituted, and no wine is produced. It is believed by many that raisin-growing is more profitable than wine-making, but this consideration has not been the General’s object in changing his procedure. He came to the conclusion that the making of wine contributed to intemperance, and therefore devoted his vineyard to the production of raisins.

Prunes drying. Fruit was partially dried in the sun, and finished in an artificial drier.