Research Paper On The California Gold Rush Of 1849

The California Gold Rush is traced back all the way to the Mexican War, which was fought from 1846 to 1848. The cause to the war was a dispute over Texas, between Mexico and America. However, by the end of this America didn’t only end up with Texas, but also Arizona, Utah, Nevada, and California. During the middle of the 19th century, America was expanding and its transportation was improving too. Once gold was discovered in California huge waves of gold hungry people came from all over the world to California, impacting California’s economy, social life, and especially its population. The Gold Rush of 1849 was a historical event in which local populations such as San Francisco drastically increased in population within a couple of days. An analysis of the social and historical significance of San Francisco, California reveals that the city played an important role in drastically increasing its population during The Gold Rush of 1849.

San Francisco has had many significant events that occurred throughout history, one of these significant events is called the gold rush of 1849.

This event led to an exponential increase in the population of San Francisco.The population of San Francisco during this historical event soared from around 14,000 to over a population of 100,000. The population eventually exceeded over 250,000. “...the population of California (excluding non-Christianized Indians) soared from about eight thousand on the eve of the rush to 93,000 – 77 percent of whom were males aged fifteen to forty – in 1850. By 1852, population reached about 250,000 – more than one percent of the nation’s population had moved to California in just four years.” (Whaples). Buildings were quickly and constantly constructed and many areas were sold in order to support this mass amount of

people.
During the Gold Rush, some men made tremendous amounts of money, some men lost tremendous amounts of money, many men traveled for numerous miles, unfortunately, some died on the way, and some were too sick to even get the chance to mine for gold. The economy of California grew at a phenomenal rate during the days of the 1849 Gold Rush. Much of this growth was made possible because at that time government didn’t interfere with economic policies. Prices rose dramatically as more people found gold and gold became widely circulated on the market. “After the arduous trip miners faced shockingly high prices for food, supplies, rent and other goods and services and endured mining camps that lacked basic sanitation.” (Whaples). Since countless minors were continuously able to find gold, merchants decided to make some money too so, they raised their fees on all sorts of commodities, from food and supplies all the way to real estate.