Those were stirring times, indeed. Few seem to understand that the decade between 1860 and 1870 was, next to the gold age of the ’50’s, the most important in the history of California. It was the period of transition from the fierce exploitation of the pioneers who looked only on the region as a thing to be despoiled of its treasures and to be abandoned. It saw the silent valleys changed to broad oceans of waving grain. It saw the foothills crowned with thrifty vineyards, saw the sure foundations laid of a great fruit industry, saw the beginning of systematic irrigation. It saw the port of San Francisco crowded with masts of vessels to carry its new-found wealth to distant lands, saw a mighty foreign commerce develop, saw the treasures of the Comstock Lode unlocked, saw a railroad stretch from the Atlantic to the Pacific. And men arose to meet the new conditions. A splendid line of merchants seized the opportunities of trade. Isaac Friedlander opened the markets of England for our wheat. Macondray Brothers built up great business interests in the Orient. The trade mark of William T. Coleman & Company was a guaranty of their goods throughout the civilized world. These names are only typical of many. A new race of mighty miners developed, men like George Hearst, J. B. Haggin, Lloyd Tevis, Alvinza Hayward, G. W. Grayson and others, whose activities extended to Utah, Nevada, Arizona, Montana and to distant Mexico, pouring a fresh river of gold and silver into California. The drift of population of the growing city also changed and the westward movement began, which will only be bounded by the ocean. In short, nearly all we have in Northern California to-day in the way of industries and enterprise can trace the starting point to that age. It was an intense, booming, hopeful decade, a period of great events and great men, when everyone at last realized that gold was the smallest part of the State’s resources and the outlook as broad as the horizon of midocean. I do not wish to interrupt the narrative to dip into general history, but it may interest the reader to have a glimpse, as we jog along, of real things and the live people of what I may be pardoned for calling the old but recent times.