Mining California

Mining California
Title Mining California PDF eBook
Author Andrew C. Isenberg
Publisher Macmillan + ORM
Pages 253
Release 2010-08-24
Genre History
ISBN 0374707200

Download Mining California Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

An environmental History of California during the Gold Rush Between 1849 and 1874 almost $1 billion in gold was mined in California. With little available capital or labor, here's how: high-pressure water cannons washed hillsides into sluices that used mercury to trap gold but let the soil wash away; eventually more than three times the amount of earth moved to make way for the Panama Canal entered California's rivers, leaving behind twenty tons of mercury every mile—rivers overflowed their banks and valleys were flooded, the land poisoned. In the rush to wealth, the same chain of foreseeable consequences reduced California's forests and grasslands. Not since William Cronon's Nature's Metropolis has a historian so skillfully applied John Muir's insight—"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the universe"—to the telling of the history of the American West. Beautifully told, this is western environmental history at its finest.

Mercury and the Making of California

Mercury and the Making of California
Title Mercury and the Making of California PDF eBook
Author Andrew Scott Johnston
Publisher University Press of Colorado
Pages 444
Release 2013-09-15
Genre History
ISBN 1457183994

Download Mercury and the Making of California Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

Exploring the development of California and the relationship between the built environments of the mercury-mining industry and the emerging ethnic identities and communities in California, Mercury and the Making of California brings mercury to its rightful place alongside gold and silver in their defining roles in the development of the American West. In this pioneering study, Andrew Johnston examines the history of California’s mercury-mining industry—and its defining role in the development of the American West. Mercury was crucial to refining gold and silver; therefore, its production and use were vital to creating and securing power and wealth in the west. The first industrialized mining in California, mercury mining had its own particular organization and structure shaped by powers first formed within the Spanish Empire, transformed by British imperial ambitions, and manipulated by groups made wealthy and powerful by controlling it. In addition, the landscapes of work and camp and the relations among the many groups—Mexicans, Chileans, Spanish, British, Irish, Cornish, American, and Chinese—throughout the industry’s history illustrate the complex history of race and ethnicity in the American West. Combining rich documentary sources with a close examination of the existing physical landscape, Andrew Johnston explores both the detail of everyday work and life in the mines and the larger economic and social structures in which mercury mining was enmeshed, revealing the significance of mercury mining to Western history.

We the Miners

We the Miners
Title We the Miners PDF eBook
Author Andrea G. McDowell
Publisher Harvard University Press
Pages 336
Release 2022-06-28
Genre History
ISBN 0674248112

Download We the Miners Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

The California Gold Rush is thought to exemplify the Wild West, yet miners were expert organizers. Driven by property interests, they enacted mining codes, held criminal trials, and decided claim disputes. But democracy and law did not extend to “foreigners” and Indians, and miners were hesitant to yield power to the state that formed around them.

New Almaden

New Almaden
Title New Almaden PDF eBook
Author Mary Hallock Foote
Publisher
Pages 20
Release 1878
Genre California
ISBN

Download New Almaden Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

The Shirley Letters from the California Mines, 1851-1852

The Shirley Letters from the California Mines, 1851-1852
Title The Shirley Letters from the California Mines, 1851-1852 PDF eBook
Author Louise Amelia Knapp Smith Clappe
Publisher Heyday
Pages 195
Release 1998
Genre History
ISBN 9781890771003

Download The Shirley Letters from the California Mines, 1851-1852 Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

A pioneer woman describes life near a northern California mining camp during the fabled "gold rush."

Mining North America

Mining North America
Title Mining North America PDF eBook
Author John R. McNeill
Publisher Univ of California Press
Pages 456
Release 2017-07-03
Genre Business & Economics
ISBN 0520279174

Download Mining North America Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

"Over the past five hundred years, North Americans have increasingly turned to mining to produce many of their basic social and cultural objects. From cell phones to cars and roadways, metal pots to wall tile and even talcum powder, minerals products have become central to modern North American life. As this process has unfolded, mining has also indelibly shaped the natural world and North Americans' relationship with it. Mountains have been honeycombed, rivers poisoned, and forests leveled. The effects of these environmental transformations have fallen unevenly across North American societies. Mining North America examines these developments. Drawing on the work of scholars from Mexico, the United States, and Canada, this book explores how mining has shaped North America over the last half millennium. It covers an array of minerals and geographies while seeking to draw mining into the core debates that animate North American environmental history generally. Taken together, the authors' contributions make a powerful case for the centrality of mining in forging North American environments and societies"--Provided by publisher.

Gold Miners & Guttersnipes

Gold Miners & Guttersnipes
Title Gold Miners & Guttersnipes PDF eBook
Author Mark Twain
Publisher San Francisco : Chronicle Books
Pages 228
Release 1991
Genre Fiction
ISBN

Download Gold Miners & Guttersnipes Book in PDF, Epub and Kindle

This classic Chronicle book remains available as a print-on-demand title. You can purchase it from an online bookseller or by order from your local bookstore.