Early California History: An Overview

  • The Name and the Geography California's history is so romantic and filled with legend that it is fitting that the region was named for a fictional island paradise described in the 16th century Spanish romance Las Serges de Esplandian, which was popular when Spain’s explorers first came to this part of North America's Pacific Coast.
  • The First Peoples of California The Spaniards, of course, were hardly the first to discover this land of wonder and extremes. The earliest Californians were adventurous Asians who made their way across the Bering Straits to Alaska thousands of years ago when a warmer climate and a now-vanished land bridge made such travel easier. These men and women and their descendants settled North and South America, spreading out to…
  • Spanish California Europeans’ contact with California began in the mid 1530s when Cortez's men ventured to Baja California. Not until 1542 did Spaniards sail north to Alta California, and Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo's expedition that year made landings as far north as modern Santa Barbara.
  • The Missions After 1769, the life of the California natives who came in contact with the Spanish was reshaped by the mission fathers, not the townspeople of the pueblos or the soldiers of the presidios. The Franciscans came to California not merely to convert the tribes to Christianity but to train them for life in a European colonial society. Conversion was seldom an entirely voluntary process,…
  • Mexican California In 1808, Spain's American colonies, one by one, began to fight for independence. Even before this spirit spread to Mexico, California felt the effects of the rebellions, for Spain's hard-pressed navy could not spare ships to bring supplies to the missions, presidios, and pueblos north of San Diego. Thus, in the dozen years that followed, local authorities relaxed restrictions on trading with non-Spanish merchants…
  • The United States and California The Mexican government and Spanish-speaking Californians became increasingly suspicious of the motives of the "Americans" of the United States. In 1844, John Charles Frémont led a party of Army topographical engineers that "accidentally" crossed the Sierras into California and traveled the length of the San Joaquin Valley before making their way home. In 1845, a commodore in the U.S. Navy, misinformed about relations between…
  • The Discovery of Gold In 1847, all waited restlessly for the fighting to end outside California. The soldiers from New York contented themselves with garrison duty and odd jobs until word came of peace, but the Mormons were discharged in the summer of 1847, and many went to work for Johann Sutter. With peace, Sutter could finally proceed with his plans to lay out a town near his…
  • The Forty Niners In the next year, close to 100,000 people went to California from the United States, Europe, and every other corner of the globe. Gold-seekers from Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, and China continued to sail across the Pacific along well-established trade routes. The journey was far more complicated for citizens of the United States. A voyage from the East Coast to California around Cape Horn…
  • Government and Law Illustration XI: View of the procession in celebration of the Admission of California, October 29, 1850. Crossing the Plaza of San Francisco. J. Prendergast, del.; on stone by Coquardon; lith. of Zakreski & Hartman. LC-USZ62-763 It was August 1848 before the United States Senate ratified the treaty ending the Mexican War and recognizing the transfer of California to American hands. Local Army commanders, "Forty-eighters,"…
  • The Mines The gold mines that were the focus of these forty-eighters and forty-niners fell into three major regions. The first discoveries were along the American River and other tributaries to the Sacramento River. Not long thereafter, gold was found in the tributaries to the San Joaquin, which flowed north to join the Sacramento in the great delta east of San Francisco Bay. The Mokelumne River…
  • Towns and Cities Three settlements were principal beneficiaries of the Gold Rush. San Francisco, a sleepy village called "Yerba Buena" until 1847, became California's major seaport, far eclipsing San Diego, San Pedro, and Monterey to the south. Almost every immigrant who came by sea passed through the town, as did most goods imported from the outside world. The rowdy city, crowded with hotels, saloons, and gambling houses,…
  • From Gold Rush to Golden State The first federal census conducted in California in 1860 counted 308,000 residents--population had almost tripled since 1847. While gold mining was still an important factor in the state economy, Californians were finding other ways to earn a living. By the mid 1850s, the state's farms had made California self-sufficient in raising wheat. Cattle ranching flourished, and by 1860, local ranches produced four times as…
  • California: Magnet for Tourists and Home Buyers Expansion of rail service in California had one result that was never anticipated by the businessmen and politicians of San Francisco and Sacramento who worked so hard for the transcontinental link: Northern California lost its monopoly on the state's population and wealth. Without a rail link, Los Angeles, the first city of Mexican California, remained a sleepy village compared to the booming towns to…
  • Other Californians If California was an exciting and hospitable place for newcomers, it no longer served the needs of groups that had lived there before the Gold Rush. Every year, illness and armed skirmishes took their toll on the Native Americans in the state. The Spanish, Mexicans, and mission fathers had confined their activities to the coast, and the tribes and clans inland had suffered comparatively…
  • The Turn of the Century in California California had become part of the life of the United States in the middle of the nineteenth century--an exotic land of untold promise on the distant Pacific Coast. At the beginning of the twentieth century, California seemed less exotic, and the land's promises seemed more limited. And these developments resulted from many factors other than the end of the rush for gold and easy…
  • Conclusion: Reading California's Early History This summary of events in California in the last half of the nineteenth century does not pretend to be a complete survey of the state's history in this period. Instead, it attempts to provide a basis for understanding the major themes of the texts included in this collection. These texts reflect the nation's contemporary changing attitude toward California, and they are a sign of…