The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, January 23, 1898, Page 5

THE SAN FRANWCISCO CALL, SUNDAY, JANUARY 23, 1893‘ b HOW THE NEWS- STARLED THE BIGGEST GOLD-RUSH INHISTOR pecple up there promised to keep yond, and beyond these the yey-blue Sierras, blue street, plar shaded in summer, it takes not five I thought at the time that it as a a bunch of forget-me-nots. The minutes to pass t ret for six weeks." higt snow covered, and the frosted- Theré 1 imagine yourself felling trees, over pine needlc llen from nder, s loma to-day out the mill race, car trees, througt Such a quiet, nd laboring in forest till it lo loma become in / to turn a wilde ing Christmas c dream of accusir feet lies the smiling, : an i the: o sand dc hundred people left in Co- :ctable little hamlet has Co- ure old You wouldn’t ; town, lying bedded in rictly conventional, 1t are nec ol e tth : (1. r loops and nole There 1.~'n;l a soul on ou only to stoop and " - the the school a dozen or. so, all the things man * v E h_ lovelin who st t one Vv b i, speculati v called the place Cullumah, whic; ch the salmon trout, caught flounder drained mill-re me the building of the mill went might h carpenter named Bennett, em- lley, this historical one where d d, bearded men, who! oehind him. But if you would realize the frenzied The interesting part of Marshall's connection with ft Coloma for Monter: He y to dise *'HM\\f' it of "its treas- ank into the ft, black « of the American search, and the thoroughness with which it was ac- the history of gold in California in the effect that tity of the dust, and passing ut now are covered with vine G complished, turn to the river—Coloma’s back door discovery made upon the man himself. U t Isaac Humphrey, a miner, i gh a thin brown g before you reach Coloma you're struck w now, for the town is mainly on the north side After that histori: ay which uncovered ¥ the, in WGeere Binphray eaine { the peach orchards the fact that every ion of earth. every union That poor, tortured American River! It has been 1in the millrace Marshall took to mining like the tt, where they arrived early 1 suddenly, and one finds of hill with hili is bor 1 on either side with bare turned and twisted from its bed till it no longer rest. He also fi 1 the mill and supplied most a few of the men half-heartedly beautiful village, whose one stones. This is the the gold-seeker nas left knows its original resting place, and it goes. mur- of the lumber of which the town of Coloma was built. | it work was going on at the mili, muring discontentedly on, its sullied waters ne-er He had all the opportunities other men had in that -permitted to regain their original transparent moun- v of golden opportunities. He, in connection with tain purity. On either side there are piled rocks Sutter, collected a sort of royalty onmining claims. upon rocks, pebbles without number, great bowlders But what he found he lost,"and what he earned was stripped bare of all covering. It seems ble 1 1 The his slipped from that mere men could have wrought such « him as does treasure trove in one’s dreams. And he There isn’'t a foot of unsifted earth on all t died in pove f mal with about $10,000 border. The framework of the town lie 1 e 1, addition granted him by the State Legislature in as though a company of giants, with rapacious hs f six years. tter use to make of those hours myriads of hours since the be- as the most fruitful. 3 nged all th He washed a the men, clustering round, w the 1d then the coarser rock. d And with every cradling ienced miner's hands, with bottom of the pan grew had combed the town and picked its bare bones clear not to be judged harshly for his in= The black dust appeared Of course, Marshall did not really discover gold temperance, his thriftlessness. They were qualities up from under the thin coating in California. of the t of the man. Neither is he to be nd grain e, fine, rich If you have the time and are interested in the made « nd California acc d of ingrati- 3 a rocker And subject, you can readily convince yourself and others tude. Th 1te’s legislators would have acted more und that a rocke that there are a dozen claimants, beginning with w had they appointed a lian for the septua- the little ¢ those of the sixteenth century, who are more or less genarian, who had been the utensil Fate chose to Indians, the carpent entitled to what fame there is in being the first to shower her billions of gold upon the world; and if . children and Mrs. We know of the existence of gold in California. their allowance for the simple tastes of an old bache- fly defined, well-de- rtunately, th watch the progr of the tt had been, -he himself But to my mind—and I have read patiently painfully all that has been printed on the subje the later discove the real discovery that wa: , when the pensio discontinued, must 1 lowed by such fruitful results was made by N n b 1 and bitter shall. The claim of Weimer is offset by the fact that The first piece of gold which I found”—this is ad not be 5o Californian in generosity. One ne that the last seven years of the old re as no U the delightful contag and the Weimer's wife names Marshall as the man who Marshall's own story—"weighed about 50 cents. Mrs. 1 the world k is the s of picked up the gold. The claim of Bennett, made late Weimer, being my treasurer, ed $440 of my money, mory of eve but the de- in the day, is rendered rather doubtful by the fact (to purchase stores ordered me), among which s r gold that in first telling of the ¢ very ne said, “Gold was the fi ce of gold which I had found. Where * s has been foun and not “I found the gold,” as that went, or where it is now, I believe nobody, E b sixty-w. announ would have been only natural. To counterbalance the knows.” @ t t in the Monterey stories of v s other old pioneers are the stories * s e R forniani 4t v of the American River of equally ers, who give to Marshall's tale “One day Me. réhall was packing up to go) begar 3 ¢ their faith and allegiance. 3 away,” says Mrs. Weimer apropos of the fourth first have seer ith blankets for sails,” writes As to the discoveries of gold before Marshall's piece of g S M tracss he cail by the man who owned the first store in Coloma, “pass time, they are of ctical importance, for they e h Sl & 2 nowiL Ber « x who were king with we not They were prematur will pivc 1 always intended gh nd main, b ng out the = 1 r such thin fts with then, in coverie r real effect upon California’s welfare and the w« made from it my mother, but I will s prosperity. : s did s 1 in prev ing them % 7 5 4 f s r But, after all, that monument overlooking the e e . € « they got to Cc peaceful va yma, theu nble Mar- tak ur choice of the stories. T be- v They depopt s and figure, is & m By xata till it was confirmed by a ; 2 y 1 and uncare me sort of composite, thinking, of bes eman at Coloma. iins, tk th invitation to st piece of gold.” he concluded den little Mecca. C £ gold in the [ found in Sutter’s mills n withou head nd little vater off,” says a can Riv It's a stone the rength ia of the forty- it perpetu- in the wor histor ! {1 actions of mea, w differe from men's lives open-hs f art in the the pink showing ; I said forty- | sdies the re fascinatingly Bue ind since if you're disposed Mail Marshall's statue and then down at to be ays January 18. and ¢ ou will understand the char pan- Nearly ¢ 19. There are then all the came ~that charm which keeps men ng and {hose who insist upon February, while Bigler's diary, from Ore from t: g, sifting and washing for all their lives. You makes it January 24. Hawalii nwn_l to 100,000 and will realize the freedom and the opportunity to live one of the curiosities of history that no date nual or six . one’'s own life unbound by conventionality and cir- istances that were given just th y.to men. You will be is which cyni , truly puted. Just as there is no n doesn’t deny. But, the letter 11, it is not the date, but once in Cali- affected by the . people men and child I wond e of a, > which will ne be we is not the man, but the thes d g0 on that wondrous pilg over-sett! highly civilized, pat- nished spirit of the time Everybody e d. Towns and farms > _tern-mad, imitative old world of ours. e 3 \ T sl eros, wood-chopper idier BT IRERS MIRIAM MICHELSON. ¥ 1 deserted or obtained leav: + a1l their energies to washing the sands from San Franc ashore to the with the sordid cry of Gold! field is left half planted, the »glected but the hovels and the means of and spot.” f the Californian on May 29. ainst the sordidness of the promptly and very humaniy er himself. The Californian , everything was suspended Iml_ succumbe ended susy worth while. A man ger mines had ¢ till averaging $100 a day. m were makin 500 a da 1500 a day at Auburn, farther n t $16,000 out cf five carloac rumored that Murphy of Murph: t $1,500.000 gold dust be- 1son of 1848. T nen n and Indians to work f their party and left at for them at ( the end of sum g lothes and rations At Brannan’s they ing. than he dur received in payment for goods $36,000 in gold t alc months. A single nugget worth "here were two worth ece, one 900 and numberless nuggets, sin- bits of , worth from $100 tc $5000. One man found a nugget worth $8000 and went raving mad th: next day. 3,000 W R U el e . drove over the other day from Placerville— e, 10se streets are frozen in hard ridges season—to visit Coloma. air was sharp, biting, with a piny, mountain fragrance that is ex- hilarating. The road wound up aronud hills upon hills, with mountains be- JAMES W. MARSHALL, . Discoverer of Gold in California. Statue erected by the State of California at Coloma, El Dorado County.