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Register of the California & Nevada 19th c. Account
Books,
1856-1892
Mss24
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Title: California & Nevada 19th c. Account Books,
Date (inclusive): 1856-1892
Collection number: Mss24
Creator:
Extent: 2 linear ft.
Repository:
University of the Pacific. Library. Holt-Atherton Department of
Special Collections
Stockton, CA 95211
Shelf location: For current information on the location of
these materials, please consult the library's online catalog.
Language: English.
Collection is open for research.
[Identification of item], California & Nevada 19th c. Account Books,
Mss24, Holt-Atherton Department of Special Collections, University of the
Pacific Library
During the late 19th c. the Washoe Valley, located half way between
Carson City and Reno, was a quiet agricultural region.A generation earlier the
three principal villages in the valley--Franktown, Washoe City and Steamboat
Springs--had been booming,due to the need for lumber and other goods and
services at the nearby Comstock Lode in Virginia City. In 1866 Washoe City is
said to have featured seventy stamp mills! During the 1860s, Washoe City was
the county seat of Washoe County and Franktown, as the site of a large saw
mill, was the principal supplier of timber to Nevada's silver mines. When the
Central Pacific Railroad was completed in 1869, however, Reno--which lay on the
route--became the county seat. Soon afterward a spur line linked Virginia City
with Reno. By 1881 Washoe City was "But the mournful relic of its former
greatness," according to Thompson & West's History of Nevada.
The Washoe general merchandise store represented by the account books in
this collection seems to have had an ample clientele. Among the companies with
which the merchant did business were Levi Strauss, Oregon City Woolens,
Standard Oil, the Star Lubricating Oil Works, the Commercial Soap Co., the
Steamboat & Washoe Lake Canal Co. and Gammans' Woodchoppers. The names list
of individual customers reads like a who's who of the early residents of the
Washoe Valley. Eleven men and women with accounts at this store are mentioned
in the Thompson & West history. Those biographied there include: George
Smith, the Twaddle brothers, I.H. Ball, W.D. Harden, and A. Sauer.
William Morris, Justice of the Peace of Township #3, Contra Costa
county, may also have operated a blacksmith shop earlier in the same region
although research has connected only one name in Morris' accounts with other
lists of Contra Costa county residents. None of his blacksmith shop customers
are named in his court minutes. It is, therefore, likely that Morris'
blacksmith business was located in a different town--quite possibly in a
different county. Since the 1856 California directories tended to use initials
in place of first names, it is very difficult to say whether the names in
Morris' account book are those of men living in a particular county.
The Morris/Contra Costa County Justice Court records feature the names
of several men mentioned in J.P. Munro-Fraser's History of Contra Costa County
(1882). Among these are Joel Clayton, founder of the town of Clayton, Romero
Mauvais, first hotelier in Clayton, Samuel Bacon, Charles Rhine, and Jerry
Morgan, all important merchants and landowners in that part of Contra Costa
county during the first two decades of its existence. These court records also
bear witness to the importance at that time of coal mining in the region.
The Uniontown, El Dorado county blacksmith's accounts also reveal
intense community involvement with mining--in this instance, copper mining. The
copper boom was a short-lived phenomenon which affected much of the Sierra
Nevada region during the Civil War. Eight different mining companies did
business with this blacksmith, although Thompson & West's History of El
Dorado County (1883) indicate that Uniontown was never more than a tiny hamlet
with one or two stores and a single blacksmith's shop. Several of the
individuals named in Thompson and West as residents of Uniontown were customers
of the shop, including: J.A. Prague, who built the first bridge in Uniontown;
H.K. Stow, who operated a store there; and, A. Lohry, who also owned a store
and suggested the name "Lotus" to the U.S. Post Office in preferrence to
"Uniontown." This account book is also a valuable source of information on the
economic status of Chinese in the Civil War era Mother Lode.
This collection consists of four account books. The first two of these
were created during the early 1890s by a Washoe Valley, Nevada general
merchandise store--possibly that operated during the 1880s by C.A. Lee of
Franktown. The third account book was owned by William Morris, who worked as a
blacksmith during 1856-57 and was later Justice of the Peace of Township #3 in
Contra Costa County as is evidenced by the presence of Justice's Minutes (1865)
in the same volume. The fourth book was created by a blacksmith in Uniontown
(Lotus), El Dorado County, Calif. (1860-1863).