Existing comment:
Golden Opportunities:
Marshall's discovery accelerated everything. By summer of 1848, hopeful treasure hunters crowded the trail to Coloma. Within a year, mining replaced agriculture as California's economic mainstay. Within three years, California became the nation's thirty-first state. Within five years, cities, schools, libraries, hospitals, a postal service, roads, and bridges existed where none had been before. In these few short years, the world came to view California as a place of golden opportunities, a reputation that endures today. |