Table of ContentsHistory of CaliforniaRoad WestLife in the California Gold RushWorks CitedCalifornia became a U.S. territory when the United States won Mexico in 1847. John Marshall discovered gold the following year, attracting people from all over the world. of the world to the port of San Francisco and its surroundings. These prospectors roamed riverbeds and mountain sides and eventually used dynamite to mine hard rock. The influx of people brought many changes to the land – from inflation and the creation of banks to the permanent settlement of the far west coast of the United States. Say no to plagiarism. Get a custom essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayHistory of CaliforniaThe state of California was owned by the Spanish in the 1600s, and it was lost when Mexico got its independence from Spain in 1821. It did not remain a Mexican possession for long. In 1846, shortly after General Sam Houston and his army won the War for Texas Independence, U.S. President James Polk sought to increase the size of the United States by annexing the west coast of the continent. He offered Mexico $40 million for the territory, but his offer was roundly rejected. Other European countries were considering California lands for their own expansion. Amid these failed negotiations, American surveyor James Charles Fremont launched the Bear Flag Rebellion, which declared California's independence from Mexico. The Mexican government refused to allow the United States to take over these lands and declared war on the United States. Zachary Taylor and later Winfield Scott lead the American armies against the Mexican enemy. After several battles, Mexican General Antonio Lopez Santa Anna ceded the disputed Mexican territories to the United States on September 17, 1847. The two countries signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which ended the Mexican War and required Mexico to surrender to the United States Mexican territory. New Mexico and California region. California became a US territory in 1850. Gold! Shortly after the war, on January 24, 1848, James Marshall discovered gold in California. He was checking the operation of a sawmill near present-day Coloma, California, located on the American River. The mill was located fifty miles from land owned by his Swiss-German partner, John Augustus Sutter. Sutter left Europe due to bankruptcy and arrived in California in 1839 after obtaining a 48,000-acre land grant from Mexico. He hoped to regain his fortune by farming. Once Marshall informed his partner of his discovery, Sutter tried to keep it a secret. He knew he had no strong rights to the land where the gold had been discovered. He also feared that his farm would be ruined by prospectors seeking wealth. The secret of the gold discovery became public and reached an opportunistic Mormon trader named Samuel Brennan. Brennan used the hysteria surrounding the discovery of gold to increase his personal fortune by raising the prices of common goods. In April 1848, Brennan purchased as many supplies as possible to stock his stores. He took a quinine bottle full of gold dust and ran through the streets of the small town of San Francisco shouting, “Gold! Gold! From the American River! He also wrote an article on the subject in his own newspaper, the California Star. In 1848, only those living in the California area answered the call. These prospectors flocked tothe land near Sutter's farm and searched the sand and gravel of the river bed with baskets and frying pans. Even Sutter's farm workers quit their jobs to pan for gold, abandoning his crops and leaving him in ruins. It took longer for the news to spread to the eastern United States. Those who lived far away needed more proof that the findings were real. The US government has provided proof of this. The military governor of California, Richard Mason, came to inspect the site where Marshall first discovered gold. He brought his aide, Lieutenant William T. Sherman. They confirmed the presence of the precious metal in an official report which was later published in various newspapers across the country. President Polk also mentioned California gold in his State of the Union address delivered on December 8, 1848. Heading West, when all of America was certain of the validity of the gold rush gold, many people, mostly men, left their jobs and families to search for gold. their fortune. A number of people living on the East Coast faced a difficult journey. Some chose to travel overland, but were slowed by the lack of a direct road or waterway. They followed what became known as the Oregon-California Trail. This difficult journey takes prospectors on a four-month journey across the country. Others left the East Coast by boat and sailed around the tip of South America to California. It was a dangerous journey that also lasted four months. Some who used the sea route attempted to shorten their travel distance by crossing the small Panama land bridge, only to find themselves facing the dangerous rainforest. Many people from foreign countries also came to California to seek their fortune. People from Australia, China, Chile, Turkey, Ireland, Germany and France all came to the port of San Francisco once the cries of gold reached foreign ports. The small town's population exploded from 850 to 80,000 almost overnight. These foreigners and Americans, all known as the “49ers,” had one thing in common: the hope of becoming rich. Gold hunters began their searches on the American River. The baskets originally used to sort gravel from the river bed were transformed into metal pans. By 1852, most of the readily available surface gold had been discovered. This forced prospectors to change their mining methods. One method was to put large quantities of soil into large toms and use river water to wash the soil of the heavier gold. Small channels called smokes were used to direct water to the operating site. A rarer method was hydraulic mining. Using high-pressure water, large sections of mountain slopes were exposed. The soil was then sifted. The clods often got stuck in nearby rivers and caused flooding of personal properties and even urban areas. When all the gold that could be found by these methods was gathered, prospectors had to turn to a process using explosives to find gold in hard rock. Life in the California Gold Rush As gold became increasingly difficult to find, xenophobia became a problem among the many cultures that had settled in the city of San Francisco. Foreigners once welcome in the city are now treated with contempt. Native Americans, who.