head and hide of a deer over the hunter's head. The make-believe then
crept along in the high grass till near enough to the quietly feeding
animals to put an arrow through one or more. All the streams were
full of fish then, and salmon swarmed in rivers that ran to the ocean.
These salmon the Indians speared or shot with arrows. They also built
runways or fish-weirs and made them so that the fish would become
crowded into a narrow passage, and could easily be dipped out with
nets or baskets.
When the Americans came here they called these Indians "Diggers,"
because they lived on what they could dig or root out of the ground.
They were very fond of grasshoppers, and ate them either dried or
raw, or made into a soup with acorn or nut-meal. Fat grubworms and
the flesh of any animal found dead was a great treat. If a whale or
sea-lion was washed ashore on the beach, the Indians gathered round it
for a feast, and soon left only the bones.
[Illustration: INDIAN WOMAN WITH PAPPOOSE.]
[Illustration: INDIAN WOMAN WITH BASKETS.]
But they had no idea of saving food, so they fattened when there was
plenty, and starved when dry years made the acorns or nuts scarce.
Having no salt, they did not try to dry or smoke the meat of deer or
other wild animals. Nor did they at first lay up nuts and seeds, as
even the squirrels or woodpeckers do, for winter use. But wandering
from place to place, they camped in the summer along the rivers, where
fish was plenty and the wild oats gave them grain. In the fall they
hunted pine-nuts and berries in the mountains, till snow drove them
down into the valleys.
Each Indian town, or rancheria, had a name, and many of these names
are still in use. At the north lived the Klamaths, Siskiyous, Shastas,
and the savage Modocs, whose months of fighting in the lava beds
caused the death of General Canby and many soldiers. The Porno tribes
of Lake county, Yrekas, Hoopas, and Ukiahs, are well known at the
present day. Tehama, Colusa, Tuolumne, Yosemite, and other places
recall the Indians who gave each its name. The San Diego Indians are
still known as Diegueños and live on a reserve, or lands set aside for
them.
Almost all the natives had Indian money, called wampum, which they
made from abalone or clam-shells by cutting out round pieces like
buttons or small, hollow beads. Little shells were also used, and the
wampum was strung on grass or on deer sinews. The Pomos still make
thousands of pieces of this money, and so many strings of it will buy
whatever the buck, or Indian man, and his mahala, or squaw, wish to
get.
General Bidwell, who came to California in 1841 and surveyed the land
for many ranches, says of the Indians at that time:--
"They were almost as wild as deer, and wore no clothes at all except
the women, who had tule aprons fastened to a belt round their waists.
In the rough work of surveying among brush and briars I gave the men
shoes, pantaloons, and shirts, which they would take off when work
was done, carry home in their hands, and put on in time to go to work
again. But they soon learned to sleep in their new things to save
trouble, and would wear them day and night till a suit dropped to
pieces. They were quick to do as the whites did, and when paid in
calico and cloth Saturday night, by Monday they had on their new
skirts or shirts all made up like ours. Yet every Indian would choose
beads for his wages, and go almost naked and hungry till the next
pay-day."
General Bidwell treated the Indians honestly and kindly, and in return
they were his friends and helped him much to his advantage. In 1847 he
settled on the great Rancho Chico, and part of his land he gave to the
Mechoopdas, as the Indian rancheria there was called. They worked to
plant orchards and at all his farm-work, and he treated them so fairly
that old men are still living on this ranch who as boys helped the
general in his tree-planting and road-building. A whole village of
these Mechoopdas live on the Bidwell place owning their houses, while
Mrs. Bidwell is their best friend and helps them in sickness and
trouble. The men work in the hop fields and fruit orchards, and the
women make baskets.
All the California Indians are basket-makers, and their work is so
well done and so beautiful that it is much prized. The Pomos of Lake
and Mendocino counties make especially fine baskets for every purpose.
Indeed, the Indian papoose, or baby, is cradled in a basket on his
mother's back; he drinks and eats from cup or bowl-shaped baskets, and
the whole family sleep under a great wicker tent basket thatched
with grass or tules. All Pomo baskets are woven on a frame of willow
shoots, and in and out through this the mahala draws tough grasses or
fine tree roots dyed in different colors, and after the pattern she
chooses. Sometimes she works into the baskets the quail's crest, small
red or yellow feathers from the woodpecker, green from the head of the
mallard duck, or beads. She also hangs wampum or bits of abalone shell
on the finest ones. The storage baskets are four or five feet high to
hold grain or acorns, and the baskets to fit the back and carry a
load are like half a cone in shape, with straps to hold the burden
in place. Their smaller berry baskets hold just a quart. Some are
water-tight and are used to cook mush in. Fish-traps and long narrow
basket-traps for quail are also made out of this willow-work.
On the Bidwell ranch is an old Indian "temescal," or sweat-house. It
is an underground hut, or cave dug out of a hillside, with a hole in
the top for smoke to reach the air. The Indians used to build a big
fire in this cave and then lie round it till dripping with sweat. A
cold plunge into the creek near by finished the bath,--Turkish, we
call it. Nowadays the Indians use this place for a meeting-room and
for dances.
The older Indians still dance and rig out in all their finery of
feathers and beads, though the young people are ashamed of their
tribal customs and wish to be like the white folks. Some of their
dances are named for a bird or animal, and the Indians must imitate by
their dress and cries the animal chosen. In the bear dance the dancer
crawls about the fire on all fours with a bear's skin about him. He
wears a chain of oak-balls round his neck, and as he shakes his head
these rattle like a bear's teeth snapping shut, while all the time he
growls savagely. The feather-dancer, with a skirt and cap of eagles'
feathers, will whirl on his toes like a top for hours, while the other
Indians sing and the master of the dance shakes a large rattle.
The California Indians are slowly passing away, and though all over
the state there are still rancherias, the land that was once their
very own will soon know them no more.
THE STORY OF SAN FRANCISCO
The Mission and Presidio of San Francisco were founded in 1776 by
Father Palou, and two little settlements grew up around the fort and
at the church. The Presidio was built where it is now, and ships used
to anchor in the bay in front of it, though the whalers usually went
to Sausalito to get wood from the hills and to fill their water-casks
at a large spring. From early Mission times the Spanish name of Yerba
Buena was given to that part of San Francisco's peninsula between
Black Point and Rincon Point. Ship-captains and sailors soon found out
that the cove or bay east of Yerba Buena was the best and least windy
place to anchor their vessels, and later on hundreds of ships found
a safe harbor there. The name Yerba Buena, or good herb, was given
on account of a little creeping vine with sweet-smelling leaves which
covered the ground and is still found on the sand-dunes and Presidio
hills.
For many years the small settlements made no progress, and the rest
of the peninsula was covered with thick woods, where the grizzly bear,
wolf, and coyote roamed, while deer were plenty at the Presidio. Then
in 1835 Governor Figueroa, the Mexican ruler of California, directed
that a new town should be started at Yerba Buena cove. The first
street, called the "foundation-street," was laid out from Pine and
Kearny streets, as they are called to-day, to North Beach. The first
house was built by Captain Richardson on what is now Dupont Street,
between Clay and Washington. The next year a trader named Jacob Leese
built a store. It was finished on the Fourth of July, and in honor of
the day he gave a feast and a fandango, or dance, at which the company
danced that night and all the next day. This was the first Fourth
celebrated in the place.
Two or three years later a new survey laid out streets between
Broadway and California, Montgomery and Powell. A fresh-water lagoon,
or lake, was near the present corner of Montgomery and Sacramento,
and an Indian temescal, or sweat-house, beside it. The bay came up
to Montgomery Street then, with five feet of water at Sansome, and
mudflats to the east. During the gold excitement of '49, when hundreds
of ships dropped anchor in the bay, many sailors deserted to go to the
mines, and some of the old vessels were hauled in on these mud-flats
and made into storehouses. All that part of the city east of
Montgomery Street is filled or made ground, and when new buildings are
to be started wooden piles or cement piers must go down to get a firm
foundation.
Until 1846 only about thirty families lived at Yerba Buena. Then a
shipload of Mormon emigrants arrived and pitched their tents in the
sand-hills. Samuel Brannan, their leader, printed the first newspaper,
_The California Star_, in '47. That year also the first alcalde, or
mayor, of the new town, Lieutenant Bartlett, appointed an engineer
named O'Farrell to lay out more streets. He surveyed Market Street and
mapped down blocks as far west on the sand-dunes as Taylor Street and
to Rincon Point or South Beach. He gave the names of such well-known
men as Kearny, Stockton, Larkin, Guerrero, and Geary to these streets.
Mission Street was the road to the Mission Dolores, and about this
time Bartlett ordered that the Presidio, the Mission, and Yerba Buena
should be one town and should be called San Francisco.
Then came the gold fever, and nearly every one left town to go to the
mines. Many people sold all they had to get money to buy mining tools
and food enough to live on till they struck gold. Men started for the
mines, leaving their houses and stores alone with no one to care for
goods or furniture.
But news of the finding of gold had reached other places, and soon
ships from the Atlantic coast, Mexico, and all over the world
began sailing into San Francisco Bay. In '49 the first steamer, the
_California_, arrived from New York, and soon five thousand people
were in San Francisco, where most of the supplies for the gold-fields
had to be bought. Many of the newcomers lived in canvas tents or
brush-covered shanties scattered about in the high sand-hills or in
the thick chaparral. Some houses were built of adobe bricks, and the
two-story frame Parker House was thought to be so fine that it rented
for fifteen thousand dollars a month. Some wooden houses were brought
out from the East in numbered pieces, like children's blocks, to be
put together here, and others thought to be fireproof were of iron
plates made in the East.
The first public school was opened in '48 and in the same building
church services were held Sundays. The first post-office was in a
store at the corner of Washington and Montgomery streets in '49. By
1850 the city had five square miles of land that had been cut down
from sand-hills or filled in on the mud-flats. The houses along the
city-front were built on piles, and the tide ebbed and flowed under
them. Long wharves for the unloading of ships ran out into deep water.
At Jackson and Battery streets a ship was used for a storehouse, and
after the earth was filled in this stranded vessel was left standing
among the houses. On Clay and Sansome streets the old hulk _Niantic_
had a hotel upon her decks, and the first city prison was in the hold
of the brig _Euphemia_.
[Illustration: INDIAN BASKETS.]
While most of the miners were steady, hard-working men, honest, and
very kind and generous to each other, some drank and gambled their
hard-earned gold-dust away with a get of men who were ready to do any
wrong thing for money. The gamblers and bad characters grew so
troublesome by '51 that the police could do little or nothing with
them. Every day some one was robbed, or murdered, and thieves often
set fire to houses that they might plunder. As the judges and police
could not control these criminals, nearly two hundred good citizens
formed a "vigilance committee." It was agreed that bad characters
should be told to leave town, and that robbers and murderers should
be punished by the committee. Not long after, the vigilance committee
hanged four men, and roughs and law-breakers left town for the mines.
Men soon learned to keep the laws and do right.
Since almost all the houses in San Francisco were light frames of wood
covered with cloth or paper, and since there was no fire department,
there were six great fires, each of which nearly burnt up the town.
The only way to stop the flames was to pull down houses or to blow
them up with gunpowder. But almost before the ashes of one fire had
cooled, wooden, cloth and paper buildings would cover whole blocks, to
be burned again before long. The fifth great fire, in '51, destroyed a
thousand houses and ten million dollars' worth of property in a night.
One warehouse containing many barrels of vinegar was saved by covering
the roof with blankets dipped in the vinegar, as no water could be
had. The iron houses that had been thought fire-proof were of no use.
Men who stayed in them found too late that the iron doors swelled with
the heat and could not be opened, so that those within were smothered
to death.
Then people began to guard against such fires by building new houses
of stone or of brick. The sixth great fire destroyed most of the
wooden buildings in the business part of the city. After that,
with two or three fire companies and engines and better houses,
people no longer dreaded the fire-bell. Water was piped into the city
from Mountain Lake, and there was plenty for all purposes.
[Illustration: SEAL ROCKS, SAN FRANCISCO.]
[Illustration: THE NEW CLIFF HOUSE, SAN FRANCISCO.]
So the city grew larger, until in '53 there were fifty thousand people
of all races and countries who called San Francisco home. Chinese and
Japanese, the Mexican, African, Pacific Islander, Greek, or Turk, or
Malay elbowed crowds of Americans, English, French, and Germans. It
was said that any foreigner could find in the city those who spoke his
language, and that gold was a word all knew.
The largest yield of gold from the mines was in '53, and the next
year was a poor year for the miners. They bought fewer goods in San
Francisco, and the storekeepers found business falling off. Too many
houses had been built, so rents went down and times were hard for
a year or two. In '55 there were many bank failures, and business
troubles of all kinds made the people restless, and roughs and
murderers carried a strong hand. Then the "law and order party," as
the vigilance committee was at that time called, began once more
the task of punishing those who robbed or killed. A list of criminal
offenders was made out, and such were sent away from the state.
One excellent result of the vigilance committee's labors was that a
"people's party," as it was called, chose the best men to govern the
city, and for years after peace and order were in San Francisco.
In '54 the city was lighted with gas for the first time, at a cost of
fifteen dollars a thousand feet. In that year also the mint began to
coin money from gold-dust, making five, ten and twenty-dollar pieces.
Lone Mountain Cemetery was laid out about this time, and the old Yerba
Buena graveyard, where the City Hall now stands, was closed.
San Francisco had, for some years, trouble about titles to property,
owing to false or defective land-grants given by the Mexicans. Men
tried to take possession of lots they had no real claim to by building
a shanty on the ground and squatting there, and the "squatter troubles"
between such land thieves and the rightful owners caused lawsuits and
shooting affairs. A land commission finally settled these disputes,
throwing out all the false claims and giving titles to the proper
persons.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO JAPANESE TEA GARDEN, SAN FRANSISCO.]
The little village of Yerba Buena has now grown to be the largest
city on the Pacific coast and one that is known the world over. It is
widely and justly celebrated as the centre of great manufacturing
and shipping interests, for its fine buildings, its climate, and its
beautiful surroundings. San Francisco Bay, the harbor the Franciscans
named for their patron saint, is noted for its picturesque scenery.
Golden Gate Park, with its thousand acres of trees and lawn and
flowers stretching out to the Pacific Ocean, the famous Cliff House,
and the Golden Gate, through which so many Argonauts sailed into
California, are the most attractive and best known places.
MEN CALIFORNIA REMEMBERS
Many pages of this book might be filled with California's roll of
honor,--with that long list of men whose names are remembered whenever
the state's history is recalled.
Explorers, Mission-builders, Argonauts, and pioneers were the men who
helped to make California the fair state you know and live in. From
the first day of the Spanish discoveries on this shore of the Pacific
Ocean, we find brave and great men who gave their best efforts, and
sometimes their lives, for California.
Let us head our brief list with Cortes, the name-giver, who dreamed
long years of the golden land he was never to see. Then Cabrillo, the
sea-king whom San Diego people honor every year because he found their
bay and first set foot on California's ground. Next comes the bold
Englishman, Sir Admiral Francis Drake, who intended that his queen,
Elizabeth, should have this Indian kingdom, as he believed it to
be. The stone Prayer-book Cross, in Golden Gate Park, was put up to
commemorate the service of prayer and psalms, offered at Drake's Bay
by Fletcher, the minister on the Admiral's ship.
Good Father Serra, the founder of the Missions, his friend
and brother-priest Father Palou of San Francisco, and their
fellow-laborers Crespi and Lasuen, helped in the work of building
churches and teaching the Indians. Governor Portola, the first Spanish
ruler of Alta California, assisted the Padres, and also found San
Francisco Bay. Lieutenant Ayala, however, sailed the first ship, the
_San Carlos_, through the Golden Gate. Another governor, de Neve,
founded San José and Los Angeles, and wrote a set of laws for the two
Californias of his time. That wise ruler, Governor Borica, ordered
schools opened and tried to get the Indians to farm their lands and to
raise hemp and flax.
Many of the old Spanish settlers and explorers have left us their
names, though they are themselves forgotten, as Martinez, Amador,
Castro, Bodega, and countless others plainly show. The Englishmen
Livermore, Gilroy and Mark West, those early settlers, Temple and Rice
at Los Angeles, Yount and Pope of Napa Valley, Don Timoteo Murphy of
San Rafael, and Lassen the Dane, for whom Lassen's Peak was named,
were among those who came here before 1830.
Governor Figueroa, called the "benefactor of Alta California" ordered
the Missions to be given up to the Indians. By directing that the
town of Yerba Buena should be laid out, he also is remembered as the
founder of San Francisco. Richardson, who carried out the governor's
orders, was the first settler and Leese built the first frame-house of
San Francisco.
In Governor Alvarado's time many Americans came to the new country,
although Alvarado and General Vallejo tried hard to keep them out.
Vallejo was then the military commander, and had headquarters at
Sonoma, where he had an adobe fort and a few soldiers to protect the
Mission of Solano. Here General Vallejo was living with his Indian and
Californian settlers when the place was taken by Ide, the leader
of the "bear-flag party." Vallejo, set free when the short-lived
"bear-flag republic" went to pieces, lived many years at Sonoma. He
was afterwards a member of the first legislature. He tried hard in
1851 to have the state capital at Vallejo; but he failed, for he did
not keep his agreement to put up buildings for government use.
A man well known in the early days was John Sutter, a Swiss, who built
a fort and settled where Sacramento now stands. He called his colony
New Helvetia, and soon had about three hundred Indians at work for
him. Some of the men were carpenters, blacksmiths, and farmers, while
the women wove blankets or a coarse cloth. His fort enclosed about an
acre of ground, with an adobe wall twenty feet high. A large gate was
shut every night to keep safe those inside this walled fort. You have
read that Marshall, who found gold, was building a sawmill for Sutter
when he picked up the precious yellow nuggets. Sutter and Marshall
quarrelled at last about the ownership of the mill at Coloma, where
the pieces of gold were picked up. Marshall died a poor man, unhappy
and neglected by the state, which has since put a costly bronze statue
over his grave.
Sutter was very active in the Micheltorena war, when Governor
Micheltorena was defeated and put out of office by Alvarado and
Castro.
The last of the Mexican governors, Pio Pico, tried his best to
prevent the rush of Americans into his country, but though Castro,
the military commander, helped him, the Americans came and stayed. And
both Pico and Castro with their soldiers were driven out of California
at last by Fremont and Stockton.
General Fremont, the "path-finder," who could easily find the best way
through a wilderness and could make maps or roads for others to
follow him, is a striking figure in California history. He made three
exploring trips to this coast, Kit Carson, the famous hunter and
trapper, being his guide and scout. From the Oregon line to San Diego,
Fremont knew the country. He was a brave Indian fighter and helped to
capture California from Mexico. Fremont was appointed governor of the
new territory by Stockton, and was the first senator from California
representing the state in Congress. In 1848 Fremont sent a map of the
country to Congress, and on it named the strait at the entrance to
San Francisco Bay the Golden Gate. He was, therefore, the first to use
this beautiful name now known the world over. His wife, Jessie Benton
Fremont, is still living in Los Angeles.
Commodore Sloat, who raised the American flag at Monterey, and
Commodore Stockton were United States naval officers who helped to
conquer the Mexican and Indian forces with the aid of Fremont and
General Kearny. These four men won the land of gold for the Union.
General John Bidwell, another "path-finder," who in 1841 led the first
party of white men over the Sierras, lived to be over eighty years of
age. He saw the state, once a wilderness where naked Digger Indians
chased elk and antelope, grow to a pleasant land of orchards and
vineyards, of great cities full of people. General Bidwell was for a
time in Sutter's employ, and surveyed nearly all the large ranches
and the roads in early days. All his life he planted trees and built
roads, and at his great Rancho Chico is one of the largest orchards in
the state. Part of his life-work was to help a tribe of savage Indians
to be good American citizens, and as one of the fathers of California
he should always be remembered.
Many notable names appear in the days when the finding of gold brought
this shore of the Pacific Ocean before the eyes of the world. Among
these are Gwin, who was chosen senator with Fremont; Larkin, widely
known as the first and last American Consul to California and for his
accounts of the gold discovery; and Halleck, first secretary of the
state and afterward General Halleck.