The Age of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the New American Dream

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Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 973 EAN: 9780385720885 ISBN: 0385720882 Label: Anchor Manufacturer: Anchor Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 592 Publication Date: 2003-10-14 Publisher: Anchor Release Date: 2003-10-14 Studio: Anchor
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Editorial Reviews: “I have found it.” These words, uttered by the man who first discovered gold on the American River in 1848, triggered the most astonishing mass movement of peoples since the Crusades. California’s gold drew fortune-seekers from the ends of the earth. It accelerated America’s imperial expansion and exacerbated the tensions that exploded in the Civil War. And, as H. W. Brands makes clear in this spellbinding book, the Gold Rush inspired a new American dream—the “dream of instant wealth, won by audacity and good luck.” Brands tells his epic story from multiple perspectives: of adventurers John and Jessie Fremont, entrepreneur Leland Stanford, and the wry observer Samuel Clemens—side by side with prospectors, soldiers, and scoundrels. He imparts a visceral sense of the distances they traveled, the suffering they endured, and the fortunes they made and lost. Impressive in its scholarship and overflowing with life, The Age of Gold is history in the grand traditions of Stephen Ambrose and David McCullough.
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: California Gold Comment: The Age of Gold is the best book that I have read (and I have read quite a few) about the California Gold Rush for it tells the story in the words of the people involved and gives a feeling of the incredible change the discovery of gold brought to the State of California. Customer Rating: Summary: Disconnected narrative Comment: Mild disappointment. Too episodic and written just north of the level of a USA Today article. I think the author intends the narrative episodes to illustrate valid historic points, but he doesn't really tie the narrative and the theses together explicitly, and he isn't a good enough writer to make them flow together implicitly. His key premise appears to be "The California Gold Rush was really important. Here are some examples." And the examples are often interesting and amusing, but not enough on which to hang a story which has no point. Customer Rating: Summary: Perhaps the finest book of it's kind. Comment: I buy more books faster than I can read them so I always have a large queue of books to read. Over half of the books I read are about history. I picked up this book intending to simply read a few pages to get an idea of its content but, once I started reading, I couldn't put it down. What Brands has done better than perhaps any other historian is put the gold rush into historical, social, political, and even world context. When gold was discovered in January of 1848, China was having a revolt that cost more lives than any other conflict of the 19th Century (approximately 13,000,000!), France was in the middle of a revolution, and depression was sweeping Europe. Ironically, the trip to the gold fields was a longer journey for Americans on the East coast than it was for any other nation bordering the Pacific Ocean. People from all over the globe dropped everything and headed for California. The journeys of those who sought gold were often the greatest adventures of their lives and many of them never survived the trip. They headed into the unknown not knowing what would happen to them and having only a vague idea of what was in store for them. Doctors, lawyers, farmers, shopkeepers, laborers, gamblers, criminals, seamen, and virtually everyone imaginable dropped everything and headed for California. The first part of the book covers some of those incredible journeys both by land and sea, relying on first-hand accounts by those you made the trip. I found that part of the book alone to be fascinating. Brands then takes us to the gold fields and briefly describes how the evolution of mining technology developed. But that's only the beginning; we learn about the amazingly rapid growth in the population of California and how it impacted the the people involved. We also learn how California's admission into the Union caused brought the underlying causes of the Civil War to a head. Unlike many historical books, Brands puts everything into context, giving meaning to his subject. I haven't done justice to this book in this review. But I can tell you that it is one of the finest books of its kind that I have read and I am a voracious reader of history. If you have any interest in history at all, you will almost certainly find this a fascinating read. H.W. Brands may be one of the finest historians of our time. I can't recommend this book too much. Customer Rating: Summary: Amazing Comment: I have learned so very much about American history from this book. I had no idea the discovery of gold in CA had affected the entire nation's history in so many ways. The book is well written, very thorough and at times even exciting in its revelations. Customer Rating: Summary: A Good Book Comment: The first half of this book is really really solid. The second half is just good. It's a collection of different stories about 7ish people, from all corners of the globe, who headed to California for the Gold Rush. More Reviews