As early as 1839, Sacramento, California, was home to one of the most enduring symbols of the American West: the saloon. From the portability of the Stinking Tent to the Gold Rush favorite El Dorado Gambling Saloon to the venerable Sutter's Fort, Sacramento saloons offered not simply a nip of whiskey and a round of monte but also operated as polling place, museum, political hothouse, vigilante court and site of some of the nineteenth century's worst violence. From librarian James Scott and the Special Collections of the Sacramento Public Library comes a fascinating history of Sacramento saloons featuring the advent of all types of gaming, the rise of local alcohol production and the color and guile of some of the region's most compelling personalities..

"Explore the history of the many saloons that sprang up in Sacramento during the bustling Gold Rush era"--

In this second part of The Schliemann Diaries we follow Heinrich Schliemann (the famous 19th century archaeologist, trader and traveller) through his diary on his second journey: his travels to America from December 1850 to March 1853. The original diary was written in English and for a small part in Spanish. This publication is a transcription and translation of Schliemann's travel diary. In 1850 the millionaire Schliemann decided to end his job as trader in Russia and to try his luck in the United States. He travelled via Europe to New York and Washington and then via Panama on to the goldfields in California. He made a second fortune in Sacramento with buying gold dust and with banking. After two years he returned to Europe and got married in St Petersburg. In this diary Schliemann describes his travels from the perspective of a wealthy business man in the mid-19th century and writes about the landscape, his visits to the theatre, the hotels he used, his much discussed meeting with the American president, his lucrative banking business in California, etc. His travels and accommodation weren't always without danger. Schliemann describes in detail the extreme heat and humidity, fatal illnesses, rainstorms, floods, mosquitoes, robbers, murderers and swindlers. Heinrich Schliemann (1822-1890) was a shrewd trader and later in life he became one of the best known archaeologists of the 19th century for discovering the legendary city of Troy and the golden masks of Mycenae. Schliemann also made many travels around the world and recorded his experiences in several diaries. In this series, all Schliemann's travel diaries will be made available to a wider public by means of a transcription, an English translation and an introduction. These publications will present a new image of the trader and archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann and the world in which he lived.

Theodore Augustus Barry (1825-1881) and Benjamin Ada Patten (1825-1877) established their credentials as California pioneers by arriving in their adopted state before January 1, 1850. Men and memories of San Francisco (1873) gives later arrivals a detailed picture of the city as it existed a few months before California statehood. They describe the streets and the residences and business that lined each thoroughfare and alley as well as the men and women who owned those homes, boarding-houses, hotels, restaurants, saloons, stores, offices, and shops. They also chronicle the fire of May 1851 which destroyed so many of the structures they describe. While they focus on the city as it was in early 1850, their sketches of its residents extend further, often forming capsule biographies of their subjects.