Mike --- The California Gold Rush IS a possibility. I have pasted in information from Wikipedia. It may be of interest to you to learn that the San Francisco 49ers (American) football team are named for the Gold Rush... and their colors are red and GOLD. When you come to California next April we should make a quick side trip to Sutter's Mill, in Coloma, on Highway 49. It is not far from where I live. Yours Aye, Lauren The California Gold Rush (1848–1855) began slowly on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill, in Coloma, California.[1] The first to hear confirmed information of the gold rush were the people in Oregon, Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), Mexico, Peru and Chile and they were the first to start flocking to the state in late 1848. By 1850 the U.S. California Census showed 92,600 people in California to which about 30,000 more people should be added because the Censuses of San Francisco (the largest city in California at about 20,000 then), Contra Costa county and Santa Clara County were lost and not included in the total. The population of California was over 110,000 in late 1850 not including the Californios or the California Indians (who were not counted). The women who came to California in the early years were a distinct minority of less than 10% of the population. The news of the discovery brought some 200,000 people to California by 1852 from the rest of the United States and abroad.[2] Of the 200,000, approximately half arrived by sea and half came overland on the California Trail and the Gila River trail. The gold-seekers, called "Forty-niners" (as a reference to 1849, which is the year President James Polk declared a gold rush), often faced substantial hardships on the trip. While most of the newly arrived were Americans, the Gold Rush attracted tens of thousands from Latin America, Europe, Australia, and eventually China. At first, the prospectors retrieved the gold from streams and riverbeds using simple techniques, such as panning. More sophisticated methods of gold recovery were developed and later adopted around the world. At its peak, technological advances reached a point where significant financing was required, increasing the proportion of gold companies to individual miners. Gold worth tens of billions of today's dollars was recovered, which led to great wealth for a few. However, many returned home with little more than they had started with. The effects of the Gold Rush were substantial. San Francisco grew from a small settlement of about 200 residents in 1846 to a boomtown of about 36,000 by 1852. Roads, churches, schools and other towns were built throughout California. In 1849 a state constitution was written, a governor and legislature chosen and California became a state in 1850 as part of the Compromise of 1850. New methods of transportation developed as steamships came into regular service. The first steamship, the SS California (1848), showed up on February 28, 1849. Soon steamships were carrying miners the 125 miles (201 km) up the Sacramento River to Sacramento, California. By 1869 railroads were built across the country from California to the eastern United States. Agriculture and ranching expanded throughout the state to meet the needs of the settlers. At the beginning of the Gold Rush, there was no law regarding property rights in the goldfields and a system of "staking claims" was developed. The Gold Rush also had negative effects: Native Americans were attacked and pushed off their lands and the mining has caused environmental harm. An estimated 100,000 California Indians died between 1848 and 1868 as a result of American immigration. On Thu, Jul 28, 2011 at 4:52 PM, Mike Boyd <mikejboyd@bigpond.com> wrote: > > Jonette > > What have you done to "serach" for James Boyd, the son, born about 1824? > > If he moved with the rest of the family in 1849 from Indiana to Dallas > County, Iowa - and was not living at home in the 1850 Census - where might > he have gone. > > Could he have talken up a farm some where else in Iowa?  Or could he have > gone to Oregan or Washington State.  Where there any "gold" rushes in that > part of the USA.  1850 would be too early for the California gold rush, I > think? > > Mike Boyd > Historical Committee, HBS >