1.
History of California before 1900
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Human history in California begins with indigenous Americans first arriving in California some 13, 000–15,000 years ago. Exploration and settlement by Europeans along the coasts and in the valleys began in the 16th century. California was acquired by the United States under the terms of the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo following the defeat of Mexico in the Mexican–American War, American westward expansion intensified with the California Gold Rush, beginning in 1849. California joined the Union as a state in 1850, due to the Compromise of 1850. By the end of the 19th century, California was still rural and agricultural. The most commonly accepted model of migration to the New World is that peoples from Asia crossed the Bering land bridge to the Americas some 16,500 years ago. The remains of Arlington Springs Man on Santa Rosa Island are among the traces of an early habitation. In all, some 30 tribes or culture groups lived in what is now California and these groups included the early-arriving Hokan family and the recently arrived Uto-Aztecan of the desert southeast. This cultural diversity was among the densest in North America, and was likely the result of a series of migrations and invasions during the last 10, 000–15,000 years. At the time of the first European contact, Native American tribes included the Chumash, Maidu, Miwok, Modoc, Mohave, Ohlone, Pomo, Serrano, Shasta, Tataviam, Tongva, Wintu, tribes adapted to Californias many climates. Coastal tribes were a source of trading beads, produced from mussel shells using stone tools. Tribes in Californias broad Central Valley and the surrounding foothills developed an early agriculture, burning the grasslands to encourage growth of wild plants. The acorns from these trees were pounded into a powder, tribes living in the mountains of the north and east relied heavily on salmon and game hunting, and used Californias volcanic legacy by collecting and shaping obsidian for themselves and for trade. The deserts of the southeast were home to tribes who learned to thrive in harsh environment by making careful use of local plants and living in oases. The indigenous people practiced various forms of forest gardening in the forests, grasslands, mixed woodlands, by burning underbrush and grass, the Native Americans revitalized patches of land whose regrowth provided fresh shoots to attract food animals. A form of farming was used to clear areas of old growth to encourage new in a repeated cycle. The relative strength of the tribes was dynamic, as the more successful expanded their territories, slave-trading and war among tribes alternated with periods of relative peace. The total population of Native California is estimated, by the time of extensive European contact in the 18th century, before Europeans landed in North America, about one-third of all natives in what is now the United States were living in the area that is now California
2.
California Gold Rush
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The California Gold Rush began on January 24,1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutters Mill in Coloma, California. The news of gold brought some 300,000 people to California from the rest of the United States, the Gold Rush initiated the California Genocide, with 100,000 Native Californians dying between 1848 and 1868. By the time it ended, California had gone from a thinly populated ex-Mexican territory to the state of the first nominee for the Republican Party. The effects of the Gold Rush were substantial, whole indigenous societies were attacked and pushed off their lands by the gold-seekers, called forty-niners. The first to hear confirmed information of the rush were the people in Oregon, the Sandwich Islands, and Latin America. While most of the newly arrived were Americans, the Gold Rush attracted tens of thousands from Latin America, Europe, Australia, agriculture and ranching expanded throughout the state to meet the needs of the settlers. San Francisco grew from a 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. The new constitution was adopted by vote, and the future states interim first governor. In September,1850, California became a state, at the beginning of the Gold Rush, there was no law regarding property rights in the goldfields and a system of staking claims was developed. Prospectors retrieved the gold from streams and riverbeds using simple techniques, although the mining caused environmental harm, more sophisticated methods of gold recovery were developed and later adopted around the world. New methods of transportation developed as steamships came into regular service, by 1869 railroads were built across the country from California to the eastern United States. At its peak, technological advances reached a point where significant financing was required, Gold worth tens of billions of todays dollars was recovered, which led to great wealth for a few. However, many returned home with more than they had started with. The Mexican–American War ended on February 3,1848, although California was firmly in American hands before that, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided for, among other things, the formal transfer of Upper California to the United States. The California Gold Rush began at Sutters Mill, near Coloma, on January 24,1848, James W. Marshall, a foreman working for Sacramento pioneer John Sutter, found shiny metal in the tailrace of a lumber mill Marshall was building for Sutter on the American River. Marshall brought what he found to John Sutter, and the two tested the metal. However, rumors started to spread and were confirmed in March 1848 by San Francisco newspaper publisher
3.
Maritime history of California
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In the northwest coast of California near the redwood forests several Indian tribes developed large dugout canoes they used for fishing, trade and warfare. These canoes were constructed by taking a tree and shaping it with hand tools. A redwood log 4 metres long and 240 centimetres diameter weighs about 2,000 kilograms and this large weight meant that the logs were selected that required a minimum of movement—usually driftwood or dead fall trees that had been blown over by the wind. Sometimes logs were cut to length and rolled into water where they could be floated to a work area. The logs were cut to length by fire and stone age hand tools. The basic procedure was to start a fire on the tree where it needed shaping. This would leave one or more centimeters of charred wood where the fire was built that would be easier to remove. By successively using small fires to char the areas that needed to be worked the logs could be shaped by the crude scrapers and rock, shellfish, a finished 4 metres long dugout canoe with a nominal 5 centimetres thickness still weighed over 100 kilograms. Most larger dugouts weighed too much to move easily and were usually just pulled up on a far enough to get them above high tide. Constructing these types of dugout canoes took considerable time and skill with stone age tools, dugout canoes typically lasted several years. Tule have a diameter, rounded green stems that grows to 1 to 3 metres tall. They grow well in marshes, wetlands or at the edges of bodies of water, the tule stem has a pithy interior filled with spongy tissue packed with air cells—this makes it float well on water as well as a good insulator. Native Americans used tule for making and thatching huts, baskets, mats, boats, decoys, hats, clothing, Tule was typically cut using deer scapula saws that had rough saw like edges cut into them. Tule has to be handled with care when green to avoid breaking the stem, to make a tule boat, green tule was cut and then spread out in the sun to dry for several days. Tule canoes were constructed of cut stalks of tule plants bundled together around a core for extra strength. The bundle of tules could be pre-bent as they were being bundled to form a raised prow, the length of each bundle depends on the size of the boat that were then typically about 10 feet to 15 feet. The bundle that formed the bottom of the canoe on which the boatman or boatmen sat, Tule canoes typically accommodated one to four people. Tule boats can be built from dried tule, by experienced canoe builders
4.
History of rail transportation in California
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In recent years, passenger rail transportation has undergone something of a renaissance, with the introduction of services such as Metrolink, Coaster, Caltrain, Amtrak California, and others. On November 4,2008, the People of California passed Proposition 1a, the early Forty-Niners of the California Gold Rush wishing to come to California were faced with limited options. From the East Coast, for example, a voyage around the tip of South America would take five to eight months. Eventually, most gold-seekers took the route across the continental United States. Each of these routes had its own deadly hazards, from shipwreck to typhoid fever to cholera or Indian attack, the very first inter-oceanic railroad which affected California was built in 1855 across the Isthmus of Panama, the Panama Railway. The Panama Railway reduced the time needed to cross the Isthmus from a week of difficult, the 1,600 mile trip from Omaha, Nebraska would now take mere days. The Wild West was quickly transformed from a lawless, agrarian frontier to what would become an urbanized, industrialized economic, of perhaps greater significance is the unbridled economic growth that was spurred on by the sheer diversity of opportunities available in the region. The four years following the Golden Spike ceremony saw the length of track in the U. S. double to over 70,000 miles, virtually the entire country was accessible by rail, making a national economy possible for the first time. As rail lines pushed further and further into the wilderness, they opened up huge areas which would have lain fallow. The railroads helped establish countless towns and settlements, paved the way to abundant mineral deposits and fertile tracts of pastures and farmland, and created new markets for eastern goods. It is estimated that by the end of World War II, rail companies nationwide remunerated to the government over $1 billion dollars, the railroads would, in time, provide equally important linkages to move the inhabitants throughout the state, interconnecting its blossoming communities. Transportation determines the flow of population, declared J. D. Spreckels, one of Californias early railroad entrepreneurs, just after the dawn of the twentieth century. Before you can hope to get people to live anywhere. you must first of all them that they can get there quickly, comfortably and, above all. Among Spreckels many accomplishments was the formation of the San Diego Electric Railway in 1892, which radiated out from downtown to north, south. Henry Huntington, the nephew of Central Pacific founder Collis P. Huntington, would develop his Pacific Electric Railway in Los Angeles, the Southern Pacific soon followed suit and the level of real estate speculation reached a new high, with boom towns springing up literally overnight. Free, daily railroad-sponsored excursions enticed overeager potential buyers to visit the many undeveloped properties firsthand, despite all of the shortcomings, in the end the State reaped innumerable and unprecedented benefits from its associations with the railroad companies, which helped put California on the map. Even today, California is well known for the abundance and many varieties of trees that are cultivated throughout the state. The only fruits indigenous to the region, however, consisted of berries or grew on small bushes
5.
History of California's state highway system
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The state highway system in the U. S. state of California dates back to 1896, when the state took over maintenance of the Lake Tahoe Wagon Road. Construction of a connected system began in 1912, after the states voters approved an $18 million bond issue for over 3000 miles of highways. The last large addition was made by the California State Assembly in 1959, the 58 mile road had been operated as a toll road until 1886, when El Dorado County bought it, the county deeded the road to the state on February 28,1896. Funding was only enough for minimal improvements, including a bridge over the South Fork American River in 1901. Also in 1895, on March 27, the created the three-person Bureau of Highways to coordinate efforts by the counties to build good roads. The bureau traveled to every county of the state in 1895 and 1896 and prepared a map of a system of state roads. Several more state highways were legislated in the decade. This new department, in addition to duties, was to maintain all state highways. On March 22,1909 the State Highways Act was passed and this law authorized the Department of Engineering to issue $18 million in bonds for a continuous and connected state highway system that would connect all county seats. To this end, the department created the three-member California Highway Commission on August 8,1911 to take charge of the construction. As with the 1896 plan by the Bureau of Highways, the Highway Commission traveled the state to determine the best routes, construction began in mid-1912, with groundbreaking on Contract One - now part of SR82 in San Mateo County - on August 7. Noteworthy portions of the built by the commission included the Ridge Route in southern California. This gave the Department of Engineering an additional $12 million to complete the original system, at this time, each route was assigned a number from 1 to 34, this system of labeling routes, although never marked with signs, remained until the 1964 renumbering. Where not serving as extensions of existing routes, these -, the three bond issues together totaled 5560 miles, of which just over 40% was completed or under construction in mid-1920. The Department of Engineering became part of the new Department of Public Works in 1921, in order to pay for the roads, a 2-cent per gallon gasoline tax was approved in 1923. The legislature continued to add highways to the system, including the Mother Lode Highway in 1921 and the Arrowhead Trail in 1925. In January 1928, the California State Automobile Association and Automobile Club of Southern California, Highways along several of the most major state highways. The California Toll Bridge Authority was created in 1929 to acquire and operate all toll bridges on highways, including the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge
6.
History of Los Angeles
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The written history of Los Angeles city and county began with a small Mexican town that changed little in the three decades after 1848, when California became part of the United States. Much greater changes came from the completion of the Santa Fe railroad line from Chicago to Los Angeles in 1885, immigrants flooded in, especially white Protestants from the Midwest. Los Angeles had an economic base in farming, oil, tourism, real estate. It grew rapidly with many suburban areas inside and outside the city limits, Hollywood made the city world famous, and World War II brought new industry, especially high-tech aircraft construction. Politically the city was moderately conservative, with a labor union sector. Since the 1960s growth has slowed—and traffic delays have become famous, LA was a pioneer in freeway development as the public transit system deteriorated. New arrivals, especially from Mexico and Asia, have transformed the demographic base since the 1960s, old industries have declined, including farming, oil, military and aircraft, but tourism, entertainment and high tech remain strong. By 3000 B. C. the area was occupied by the Hokan-speaking people of the Milling Stone Period who fished, hunted sea mammals and they were later replaced by migrants — possibly fleeing drought in the Great Basin — who spoke a Uto-Aztecan language called Tongva. The Tongva people called the Los Angeles region Yaa in Tongva, by the time of the arrival of the Spanish in the 18th century A. D. there were 250,000 to 300,000 native people in California and 5,000 in the Los Angeles basin. Since contact with Europeans, the people in what became Los Angeles were known as Gabrielinos and Fernandeños, the land occupied and used by the Gabrielinos covered about four thousand square miles. They were part of a group of trading partners that included the Chumash to the west, the Cahuilla and Mojave to the east. Their trade extended to the Colorado River and included slavery, the lives of the Gabrielinos were governed by a set of religious and cultural practices that included belief in creative supernatural forces. They worshipped a god, Chinigchinix, and a female virgin god. Their Great Morning Ceremony was based on a belief in the afterlife, in a purification ritual similar to the Eucharist, they drank tolguache, a hallucinogenic made from jimson weed and salt water. Their language was called Kizh or Kij, and they practiced cremation, generations before the arrival of the Europeans, the Gabrielinos had identified and lived in the best sites for human occupation. The survival and success of Los Angeles would depend greatly on the presence of a nearby and its residents would provide the colonists with seafood, fish, bowls, pelts, and baskets. For pay, they would dig ditches, haul water, and they often intermarried with the Mexican colonists. In 1542 and 1602 the first Europeans to visit the region were Captain Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo and it would be another 166 years before another European would visit the region
7.
History of Pasadena, California
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Pasadena is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. Famous for its history and the hosting of the Tournament of Roses Parade since 1890. Pasadena was founded in 1874 and incorporated in 1886, the original inhabitants of Pasadena and surrounding areas were members of the Native American Indians Hahamog-na tribe, a branch of the Tongva Nation. They spoke the Tongva language that lived in the Los Angeles Basin for thousands of years, Tongva dwellings lined the Arroyo Seco in present-day Pasadena and south to where it joins the Los Angeles River and along other natural waterways in the city. They lived in thatched, dome-shape lodges, for food, they lived on a diet of acorn meal, seeds and herbs, venison, and other small animals. They traded for fish with the coastal Tongva. They made cooking vessels from steatite soapstone from Catalina Island and that trail has been in continuous use for thousands of years. An arm of the trail is still in use up what is now called Salvia Canyon. When the Spanish occupied the Los Angeles Basin they built the San Gabriel Mission and renamed the local Tongva people Gabrielino Indians, today, several bands of Tongva people live in the Los Angeles area. The Rancho comprised the lands of todays communities of Pasadena, Altadena, prior to the annexation of California in 1848, the last of the Mexican owners was Manuel Garfias who retained title to the property after statehood in 1850. Garfias sold sections of the property to the first Anglo settlers to come into the area, Benjamin Eaton, the father of Fred Eaton, much of the property was purchased by Benjamin Wilson who established his Lake Vineyard property in the vicinity. Wilson, known as Don Benito to the local Indians, was owner of the Rancho Jurupa. He is the grandfather of WWII General George S. Patton, Jr. and had Mount Wilson named for him. In 1873, Wilson was visited by one Dr. Daniel M. Berry of Indiana who was looking for a place in the country that could offer better climate to his patients, most of whom suffered from tuberculosis. Berry was an asthmatic and claimed that he had his best three nights sleep at Rancho San Pascual, to keep the find a secret, Berry code-named the area Muscat after the grape that Wilson grew. To raise funds to bring the company of people to San Pascual, Berry formed the Southern California Orange, the newcomers were able to purchase a large portion of the property along the Arroyo Seco and on January 31,1874, they incorporated the Indiana Colony. As a gesture of good will, Wilson added 2,000 acres of then useless highland property, at the time, the Indiana Colony was a narrow strip of land between the Arroyo Seco and Fair Oaks Avenue. On the other side of the street was Wilsons Lake Vineyard development, after more than a decade of parallel development on both sides, the two settlements merged into the City of Pasadena
8.
History of Piedmont, California
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The history of Piedmont, California, covers the history of the area in Californias San Francisco Bay Area that is now known as Piedmont, up to and beyond the legal establishment of a city. In 1850, what is now Piedmont was part of Rancho San Antonio and this area, owned by the Peralta family, covered much of the northeastern shore of San Francisco Bay, now northern Alameda County. Rancho San Antonio was sparsely populated except for cattle and the vaqueros who tended them, in 1860, retired South Carolinian Congressman Isaac Holmes bought a piece of land from his neighbor Reed. The area included Bushy Dell Creek, a creek runs through the dog-walking trail of modern-day Piedmont. Holmes bathed in the foul-smelling pink water of a spring, believing the water beneficial for his rheumatism. In 1870, Walter Blair bought over 800 acres of land in the foothills of East Bay, where the spring was located he built the Piedmont Springs Hotel, of 20 bedrooms and five dining rooms. The water of the spring was thought to have curative powers, wealthy San Franciscans retired to the hotel during trips to the country. In addition to the hotel, Blair built a farm on what is now Highland Avenue. In April 1877, James Gamble bought a 350-acre tract of land from Blair, and formed the Piedmont Land Company, along with James deFremery, George W. Beaver, L. A. Booth, and T. L. Barker. The Piedmont Land Company hired landscape engineer William Hammond Hall to plan the avenues, the first auction of land took place on April 10,1877. In January 1891, the women of Piedmont led a movement to block the sale of liquor at the Piedmont Springs Hotel. They petitioned the Alameda County Board of Supervisors to withdraw the license granted to the owner of the hotel. Prominent signers included Annie Barton, Anna Richardson, N. Randall, Florence Wing, Inez Craig, M. Laurence, Ethyl Robert, the liquor controversy ended quickly with the Piedmont Springs Hotel fire. On November 17,1892, sparks from the chimney of the set the roof on fire. Newspapers reported that Firefighters had to arrive from Oakland, two later, at 11,30 a. m. to contain the flames. Jack London never actually lived in Piedmont, because in 1900, after marrying Bess Maddern, the newlywed couple settled in a redwood bungalow in the eastern hills of unincorporated Oakland, later to become part of the present-day city of Piedmont. At the time, this area was growing into a community for artists and it was here that London wrote his novel Call of the Wild. Londons two daughters, including Joan London, were born during this time, in 1902, London moved to 206 Scenic Avenue, and tried to create a childhood he never had, Piedmont historian Ann Swift wrote
9.
History of Sacramento, California
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The city was named after the Sacramento River, which forms its western border. The river was named by Spanish cavalry officer Gabriel Moraga for the Santisimo Sacramento, before the arrival of Europeans, the Nisenan branch of the Native American Maidu inhabited the Sacramento Valley area. The California Gold Rush started when gold was discovered at Sutters Mill, one of Sutter, however, its location caused the city to periodically fill with water. Fires would also sweep through the city, to resolve the problems, the city worked to raise the sidewalks and buildings and began to replace wooden structures with more resilient materials, like brick and stone. The city was selected as the capital in 1854 after Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo failed to convince the state government to remain in the city of his namesake. Indigenous people such as the Miwok and Maidu Indians were the inhabitants of the north Californian Central Valley. However, no explorer had yet discovered the Sacramento Valley region nor the Golden Gate strait, neither did Gabriel Moraga, who was the first European to enter the Sierra in 1808 and was responsible for naming the Sacramento River, although he incorrectly placed the rivers in the region. The Mexicans, who had declared independence in 1821, shared Spanish sentiments, as a result, he granted Sutters request on the condition that Sutter would become a Mexican citizen. Sutter commenced to build a fort of his namesake, Sutters Fort, in 1840, John Sutter employed both white people and Native Americans for many mundane and military tasks regarding New Helvetia. As New Helvetia continued to develop economically, Sutter constructed a ranch at the Nisenan village of Hok and named it Hock Farm, New Helvetia was considered a stable colony by 1844, and was the only foreigner-friendly locale in Alta California at the time. Among other foreigners, the Donner Party had designated Sutters Fort their destination during a journey that placed them across the Sierra mountains in the wintertime. Sutters empire began to disintegrate when he decided to back the unpopular Alta Californian governor Manuel Micheltorena, Sutter was jailed as a result, but not before Micheltorena issued the Sobrante Grant, which added 88,000 acres of land to New Helvetian territory. In 1845, Castro arrived at Sutters Fort and offered a deal to purchase New Helvetia, Sutter declined, agreeing reluctantly, Sutter raised the Bear Flag over his fortification. However, he treated the Vallejos, whom he considered friends, as guests, while the Bear Flaggers under William B. The United States initiated the Mexican-American War in 1846 against Mexico in the wake of the U. S. annexation of the Republic of Texas, whose independence Mexico had not recognized. California, along with Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, most of Arizona and Colorado, and parts of Oklahoma, Kansas, thus, Sutters New Helvetia fell under U. S. control. Continuing business as normal, John Sutter dispatched associate James W. Marshall, in January 1848, Marshall detected a flake of gold on the ground at the site of Sutters new mill, and after conducting tests, determined the minerals authenticity. Word leaked about the discovery nearly immediately, disappointed with what had become of his holdings, Sutter placed his son as head of fort business operations and retired to Hock Farm
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