BGuthrie Photos: CA -- Los Angeles -- Wells Fargo History Museum

CA -- Los Angeles -- Wells Fargo History Museum:

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks including AI scrapers can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. FARGO_100727_03.JPG: Pony Express Isolated Californians wanted news! Four weeks by sea and three weeks by stagecoach across Texas was just too slow. Russell, Majors & Wendell, a Kansas freighting firm, had the solution: Up-to-date news over the Central route in only ten days via a Pony Express. On April 3, 1860, their colorful venture began. Youthful horsemen raced 1,966 miles between St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California, carrying 20 pounds of letters at $5 per half ounce. Changing horses every 12 miles, they switched the mail mochila eight times during an average run. In mid-April, 1861, Wells Fargo stepped in to run the route west of Salt Lake City and printed $2-per-half-ounce stamps to reflect a reduced rate. On October 25, 1861, the Overland Telegraph ended the Pony Express, but not its legend. During its eighteen months, riders had carried 35,000 letters, two-thirds going east. Wells Fargo's role: In April 1861, Wells, Fargo & Co. took over operation of the Pony route west of Salt Lake City, Utah. The Central Overland California & Pike's Peak Express continued to operate the Pony route east of that point. Wells Fargo also set the rates, printed stamps, and provided oversight for the whole route. Wells Fargo reduced postage prices to $2 per half ounce, then $1, and printed stamps used over the entire line. At these prices, California businesses and newspapers became regular customers. With the coming of the Civil War, the Overland Mail Company, dominated by Wells Fargo, relocated its stagecoach route away from the south and southwest, and on July 1, 1861, commenced operations along the central route. Its new government mail contract required a semi-weekly Pony Express. Wells Fargo reduced the postage to $1 per half ounce, and issued new stamps for eastbound mail. From its New York office, Wells Fargo provided $1 franked (with pre-printed postage) envelopes, and $1 "garter" design stamps for overweight letters, covering westbound charges. Across the country in 10 days! The Pony Express -- the very words bring up visions of blindingly-fast riders on horseback, galloping in a cloud of dust across the western frontier. From April 1860 to October 1861, Pony Express riders carried mail 1,900 miles between Missouri and California in a lightning-fast ten days. For its last six months in 1861, Wells, Fargo & Co. played a role in operating this vital mail service and larger-than-life western legend. Riders, chosen for their fast riding, daring and light weight, each rode 75-mile segments of the route between St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California, changing horses five times at stations along the way.
2. FARGO_100727_06.JPG: Wells Fargo "Lightning Line" Rider
3. FARGO_100727_17.JPG: Miss UP_TO_DATE ne'er goes without the Checks the Traveler knows about Wells Fargo Travelers Checks
4. FARGO_100727_18.JPG: Safe, convenient, and economical: Wells Fargo Travelers Checks. The "Wells Fargo Girl" -- "Miss Up-to-Date" -- symbolized the traveler who, throughout the world, found them as good as gold. From the 1890s, tourists knew such checks were a necessity, and Wells Fargo, with its network of express offices and correspondents in the United States and around the world, could easily offer them. The Company began with ":Travelers Money Orders" in 1903, and then by 1910 chose the more descriptive name of "Travelers Checks."
5. FARGO_100727_26.JPG: Keith Christie (b. 1935) came with his family from Minnesota to California as a child, and began sketching horses. His natural artistic talent and fascination with Western Americana won him a prize for his artwork when he was still a high school student. After service in the Marine Corps, Christie attended college where he turned to sculpture. Wells Fargo Bank spotted Christie's talent and purchased his first major sculpture, a stagecoach pulled by a six-horse team. Since the success of Christie's first edition, he has steadily turned out action-oriented sculpture and oils which capture the tone and texture of Western History. His works are displayed in museums and galleries throughout the United States.
6. FARGO_100727_51.JPG: Hopi Girls George Carlson, 1991, bronze Four young Hopi women, oriented to the cardinal points of the compass, collect water at their village catch basin. They wear the traditional dress and hair style of whorls (coils) over their ears, to show that they are still unmarried. The Hopi are farmers who live in pueblos on three mesas in northeastern Arizona.
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Bigger photos? To save server space, the full-sized versions of these images have either not been loaded to the server or have been removed from the server. (Only some pages are loaded with full-sized images and those usually get removed after three months.) I still have them though. If you want me to email them to you, please send an email to guthrie.bruce@gmail.com and I can email them to you, or, depending on the number of images, just repost the page again will the full-sized images.
Same Subject: Click on this link to see coverage of items having the same subject: [Museums (History)]
2010 photos: My office at the main Commerce Department building closed in October and I was shifted out to the Bureau of the Census in Suitland Maryland. It's good to have a job of course but that killed being able to see basically any cultural events during the day. There's basically nothing of interest that you can see around the Census building. Overnight trips this year: Civil War Trust conferences (Lexington, KY and Nashville, TN), and my 5th consecutive San Diego Comic-Con trip (including Los Angeles). Equipment this year: I mostly used the Fuji S100fs until the third one broke and I started sending them back for repairs. Then I used either the Fuji S200EHX or the Nikon D90 until I got the S100fs ones repaired. At the end of the year I bought a Nikon D5000 but I returned it pretty quickly. Number of photos taken this year: about 395,000..
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