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San Francisco grew from a small settlement of about 200 residents in 1846 to a boomtown of about 36,000 by 1852. Roads, churches, schools and other towns were built throughout California. In 1849 a state constitution was written.
- Sutter’s Mill
- Gold Fever Strikes
- Polk Spreads Gold Fever
- The ’49ers Come to California
- Gold Rush Politics
- California's Mines
- Impact of The Gold Rush
On January 24, 1848, James Wilson Marshall, a carpenter originally from New Jersey, found flakes of gold in the American River at the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains near Coloma, California. At the time, Marshall was working to build a water-powered sawmill owned by John Sutter, a German-born Swiss citizen and founder of a colony of Nueva Helve...
Though Marshall and Sutter tried to keep news of the discovery under wraps, word got out, and by mid-March at least one newspaper was reporting that large quantities of gold were being turned up at Sutter’s Mill. Though the initial reaction in San Franciscowas disbelief, storekeeper Sam Brannan set off a frenzy when he paraded through town displayi...
When the news reached the East Coast, press reports were initially skeptical. Gold fever kicked off nationwide in earnest, however, after December 1848, when President James K. Polkannounced the positive results of a report made by Colonel Richard Mason, California’s military governor, in his inaugural address. As Polk wrote, “The accounts of abund...
Throughout 1849, people around the United States (mostly men) with gold fever borrowed money, mortgaged their property or spent their life savings to make the arduous journey to California. In pursuit of the kind of wealth they had never dreamed of, they left their families and hometowns. In turn, women left behind took on new responsibilities such...
The Gold Rush undoubtedly sped up California’s admission to the Union as the 31st state. In late 1849, California applied to enter the Union with a constitution that barred the Southern system of racial slavery, provoking a crisis in Congress between proponents of slavery and anti-slavery politicians. According to the Compromise of 1850, proposed b...
After 1850, the surface gold in California largely disappeared, even as miners continued to arrive. Mining had always been difficult and dangerous labor, and striking it rich required good luck as much as skill and hard work. Moreover, the average daily take for an independent miner working with his pick and shovel had by then sharply decreased fro...
New mining methods and the population boom in the wake of the California Gold Rush permanently altered the landscape of California. The technique of hydraulic mining brought enormous profits but destroyed much of the region’s landscape. Dams designed to supply water to mine sites in summer altered the course of rivers away from farmland, while sedi...
- Missy Sullivan
- 3 min
Jun 18, 2024 · By about 1855, more than 300,000 people had arrived. Most were Americans, though a number of settlers also came from China, Europe, and South America. The massive influx gave rise to numerous cities and towns, with San Francisco gaining particular prominence. The Gold Rush was credited with hastening statehood for California in 1850.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
By 1849, the non-native population of California had grown to almost 100,000 people. Nearly two-thirds were Americans.
- American Experience
Jun 17, 2024 · By the end of 1849, California’s population skyrocketed to an estimated 100,000 people. By 1854, roughly 300,000 people had moved to California, helping fulfill Manifest Destiny through Westward Expansion.
- Randal Rust
Overview. The 1848 discovery of gold in California set off a frenzied Gold Rush to the state the next year as hopeful prospectors, called “forty-niners,” poured into the state. This massive migration to California transformed the state’s landscape and population.
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Jan 24, 2023 · Though the California gold rush sputtered to an end around 1855, it cast a long shadow over American history in more ways than one. As National Geographic notes, it transformed California and quiet towns like San Francisco and Sacramento turned into humming metropolises.
