Taking a Look Back at the Gold Rush

On January 24, James Marshall, who was an American carpenter and saw mill operator, saw something that caught his eye. It was gold. “It made my heart thump, for I was certain it was gold,” he said. He was building a sawmill along the American River for John Sutter, a German Swiss pioneer. Marshall, then, hurried back to his workers to show what he had found. After showing his crew, he rushed to Sutter’s fort, which is now today near Sacramento,California. The two tried to keep the word of the gold on a low key, for Sutter feared that his plan with his mill would be ruined. But word traveled and soon everyone had heard of the discovery. At first many didn’t believe that the discovery was true, but few people knew what California was like.

Sam Brannan, a store owner in Sutters Creek, changed everybody’s mind in May of 1848. When he came back from San Francisco, he broke a bottle to show gold dust flying out of it. Sam Brannan, later on, became the first millionaire. Then on March 15, a newspaper, The Californian, covered the first story about the gold. Soon towns and cities became smaller and smaller for everyone. Most of the men were leaving in search for gold. Soon, John Sutter began losing workers as well. Even they wanted to go search for the gold and hope to get rich. As many people left their homes in search for the gold, the word got around and soon different parts of the world found out about the gold.

At first there were only two routes to California, a sea voyage or the overland route. With the sea voyage it took about half a year to finally get to California. It would start at New York and go around the tip of South America to San Diego or San Francisco. On many of these ships several people got seasick. Also...

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...rock the cradle back and forth to separate dirt and gold. As miners looked for gold they had to start to protect their land, known as claim. There were also people who were called claim jumpers these people would try to steal the best mining stops that were already claimed. Many of these claim jumpers would kill the miner if it was a chance for gold. During the gold rush two newspaper shut down in San Francisco, for even they had the gold rush fever. As time went on and more people came in search for gold, there became less gold. Still people came to see if they could find any. By 1855 the gold rush was over for no one could find gold.

As time went on there were several sighting of gold. In Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, South Dakota, Utah, Wyoming, but these camps only lasted for about a year. None being as great as the California Gold Rush.