Hi Bob, your posts give so many fun details to explore. I thought it might be interesting to note what cargo the ANTELOPE brought to SF April 14, 1860: The arrival of the first pony-express rider and his horse in San Francisco was aboard the steamer ANTELOPE! The trip started at St Joseph, Missouri, 6:30pm April 3, covered nineteeen hundred and sixty four miles, and was made in nine days , twenty-three hours! It ended in San Franciso when the steamer arrived an hour past midnight, April 14. The rider (this source does not give his name)was greeted in Placerville with gun salutes and speeches, the legislature in Sacramento adjouned in his honor, and he was put aboard the ANTELOPE amid "the booming cannons, ringing of bells and cheering of the multitude". He was greeted in San Francisco "by a crowd such as had not assembled since the February morning eleven years earlier when the CALIFORNIA arrived". ( The CALIFORNIA arrived in San Francisco Feb 28, 1849-carrying 400 fortune hunters-however it was built to carry 150! There were 1500 hundred folks at the Isthums hoping get on board ~~!) The pony express was thereafter greeted with crowds at 3:45 every Wednesday and Saturday in front of Wells, Fargo and Co to see the express rider depart with his pouches. The above info gathered from _San Francisco, Port of Gold_ by William Camp. You can also read more about The Pony Express at this site. http://www.ccnet.com/~xptom/ Have fun, Carolyn Bob wrote: "I put plenty of ballast and scuttled her...She cost me $500. I slipped her in very quietly one bright moonlight morning about 3 o'clock. Before I could drop her to the bottom, the Pacific Wharf Company had the [steamer] ANTELOPE astern, and before I could prevent it, she had fastened a line to my boat and began to steam away. She didn't take me too many feet, though, for with a cutlass, I cut the line and with pistol in hand ordered them to keep off. They did so."