The discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill in Coloma on January 24, 1848, initiated one of the largest migrations in US history. Between 1849 and 1855, hundreds of thousands of migrants arrived in Northern California hoping to find gold in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The rapid population growth and economic prosperity led to boomtowns, banks, and railroads, making California eligible for statehood in 1850. An international cast of gold-seekers, merchants, and tradespeople arrived by land and through the port of San Francisco, which was transformed from a small village to a cosmopolitan metropolis. Jewish pioneers, many of whom had been merchants in Europe, opened stores and businesses in small towns and mining camps in and around the Mother Lode. They established benevolent societies and cemeteries, founded synagogues and companies, held public office and positions of influence, and contributed greatly to the multicultural fabric of the Gold Country.

In 1848, news of the California Gold Rush swept the nation and the world. Aspiring miners, merchants, and entrepreneurs from all corners of the globe flooded California looking for gold. The cry of instant wealth was also heard and answered by Jewish communities in Europe and the eastern United States. While all Jewish immigrants arriving in the mid-nineteenth century were looking for religious freedoms and economic stability, there were preexisting Jewish social and religious structures on the East Coast. California's Jewish immigrants become founders of their own social, cultural, and religious institutions. Jewish Voices of the California Gold Rush examines the life of California's Jewish community through letters, diaries, memoirs, court and news reports, and photographs, as well as institutional, synagogue, and organizational records. By gathering a wealth of primary source materials-both public and private documents-and placing them in proper historical context, Ava F. Kahn re-creates the lives within California's Jewish community. Kahn takes the reader from Europe to California, from the goldfields to the developing towns and their religious and business communities, and from the founding of Jewish communities to their maturing years-most notably the instant city of San Francisco. By providing exhaustive documentation, Kahn offers an intimate portrait of Jewish life at a critical period in the history of California and the nation. Scholars and students of Jewish history and immigration studies, and readers interested in Gold Rush history, will enjoy this look at the development of California's Jewish community.

The very name Deadwood conjures up vivid Wild West images: saloons with swinging doors, brazen dance-hall girls, buckskin-clad Calamity Jane roaming the streets with her erstwhile paramour, Wild Bill Hickok. The setting is the lawless Dakota Territory of 1876 at the start of the Black Hills gold rush, a stampede for the golden pay dirt. One would hardly expect to find a Jewish pioneer grocer named Jacob Goldberg in this scene, yet Deadwood's story is incomplete without Goldberg. And Goldberg's story is incomplete without either Calamity Jane or Wild Bill. Not just Goldberg, but Finkelstein (also known as Franklin), Stern (also known as Star), Jacobs, Schwarzwald, Colman, Hattenbach, and many other Jews joined the throngs. The Jews provided much more than overalls, chamberpots, and the chambers in which to put them. They also became the mayors, legislators, and civic leaders who helped bring sense and stability to this unruly expanse.

A moving and unsettling exploration of a young man's formative years in a country still struggling with its past As a Jew in postwar Germany, Yascha Mounk felt like a foreigner in his own country. When he mentioned that he is Jewish, some made anti-Semitic jokes or talked about the superiority of the Aryan race. Others, sincerely hoping to atone for the country's past, fawned over him with a forced friendliness he found just as alienating. Vivid and fascinating, Stranger in My Own Country traces the contours of Jewish life in a country still struggling with the legacy of the Third Reich and portrays those who, inevitably, continue to live in its shadow. Marshaling an extraordinary range of material into a lively narrative, Mounk surveys his countrymen's responses to "the Jewish question." Examining history, the story of his family, and his own childhood, he shows that anti-Semitism and far-right extremism have long coexisted with self-conscious philo-Semitism in postwar Germany. But of late a new kind of resentment against Jews has come out in the open. Unnoticed by much of the outside world, the desire for a "finish line" that would spell a definitive end to the country's obsession with the past is feeding an emphasis on German victimhood. Mounk shows how, from the government's pursuit of a less "apologetic" foreign policy to the way the country's idea of the Volk makes life difficult for its immigrant communities, a troubled nationalism is shaping Germany's future.

From the author of Hellacious California!, deeply human stories of the California Gold Rush generation, full of brutality, tragedy, humor, and prosperity. In less than ten years, more than 300,000 people made the journey to California, some from as far away as Chile and China. Many of them were dreamers seeking a better life, like Mifflin Wistar Gibbs, who eventually became the first African American judge, and Eliza Farnham, an early feminist who founded California's first association to advocate for women's civil rights. Still others were eccentrics—perhaps none more so than San Francisco's self-styled king, Norton I, Emperor of the United States. As Gold Rush Stories relates the social tumult of the world rushing in, so too does it unearth the environmental consequences of the influx, including the destructive flood of yellow ooze (known as “slickens”) produced by the widespread and relentless practice of hydraulic mining. In the hands of a native son of the Sierra, these stories and dozens more reveal the surprising and untold complexities of the Gold Rush. “Seamlessly fuses academic rigor, original reporting and emotional intensity into one meditation on an era.... If the task of the historian is to be faithful to lost truths, then Noy's latest exploration succeeds on every level, and does so in a way that will keep readers wanting to dig deeper into the past.”—Scott Thomas Anderson, Sierra Lodestar “An original and lively look at all the usual suspects, plus bears, weather, women, Joaquín, disappointment and dissipation…. Exhaustively researched and highly entertaining.”—JoAnn Levy, author of They Saw the Elephant: Women in the California Gold Rush

Isaias Hellman, a Jewish immigrant, arrived in California in 1859 with very little money in his pocket and his brother Herman by his side. By the time he died, he had effectively transformed Los Angeles into the modern metropolis we see today. In Frances Dinkelspiel's groundbreaking history, the early days of California are seen through the life of a man who started out as a simple store owner only to become California's premier money-man of the late 19th and early 20th century. Growing up as a young immigrant, Hellman quickly learned the use to which "capital" could be put, founding LA's Farmers and Merchants Bank, that city's first successful bank, and transforming Wells Fargo into one of the West's biggest financial institutions. He invested money with Henry Huntington to build trolley lines, lent Edward Doheney the funds that led him to discover California's huge oil reserves, and assisted Harrison Gary Otis in acquiring full ownership of the Los Angeles Times. Hellman led the building of Los Angeles' first synagogue, the Wilshire Boulevard Temple, helped start the University of Southern California and served as Regent of the University of California. His influence, however, was not limited to Los Angeles. He controlled the California wine industry for almost twenty years and, after San Francisco's devastating 1906 earthquake and fire, calmed the financial markets there in order to help that great city rise from the ashes. With all of these accomplishments, Isaias Hellman almost single-handedly brought California into modernity. Ripe with great historical events that filled the early days of California such as the Gold Rush and the San Francisco earthquake, Towers of Gold brings to life the transformation of California from a frontier society whose economy was driven by the barter of hides and exchange of gold dust into a vibrant state with the strongest economy in the nation.

"What a fabulous idea! This very rich part of our country has so much to offer visitors. This guide will really make their journey so much more interesting." -Joan Lunden, former Good Morning America co-host and Sacramento native "Useful and comprehensive . . . a good reference for any visitor or resident." -Phil Isenberg, former mayor of Sacramento "This excellent guide succeeds admirably . . . a wealth of information." -James E. Henley, executive director, Sacramento History Center and Museum and History Division Rich in history and nineteenth-century charm, the California capital and the surrounding Sacramento Valley offer adventures for every traveler's taste. This guidebook covers virtually every aspect of this fascinating area, including Old Sacramento, highlights of the Gold Country, and Sacramento Valley, as well as a comprehensive restaurant and hotel listing. For an unforgettable vacation in and around Sacramento, take along the Pelican Guide to Sacramento and the Gold Country.