The Project Gutenberg eBook, By the Golden Gate, by Joseph Carey

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Title: By the Golden Gate

Author: Joseph Carey

Release Date: July 11, 2004 [eBook #12883]

Language: English

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BY THE GOLDEN GATE***

E-text prepared by the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team

BY THE GOLDEN GATE

or

San Francisco, the Queen City of the Pacific Coast; with Scenes and Incidents Characteristic of its Life

By

JOSEPH CAREY, D.D.

A Member of the American Historical Association

1902

To My Beloved Wife

this volume

is affectionately inscribed.

PREFACE

This work now offered to the public owes its origin largely to the following circumstance: On the return of the author from California and the city of Mexico, in November, 1901, his friend, the Rev. John N. Marvin, President of the Diocesan Press, asked him to contribute some articles to the Diocese of Albany. From these "sketches" of San Francisco this book has taken form. There are chapters in the volume which have not appeared in print hitherto, and such portions as have been already published have been thoroughly revised. Much of the work has been written from copious notes made in San Francisco, and impressions received there naturally give a local colouring to it in its composition.

It is not a history, nor yet is it a guide book; but it is thought that it will be helpful to tourists who visit one of the most picturesque and interesting cities in the United States. It furnishes in a convenient form just such information as the intelligent traveller needs in order to enjoy his walks and rides through the city. The writer in his quest among books could not find any thing exactly of the character here produced; and therefore he is led to give the results of his observations and studies with the hope that the perusal of this volume, sent forth modestly on its errand, will not prove an unprofitable task.

THE AUTHOR.

November 1st, 1902.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

WESTWARD

CHAPTER II

VIEWS FROM THE BOAT ON THE BAY

CHAPTER III

SAN FRANCISCO AND THE DISCOVERY OF GOLD

CHAPTER IV

THE STORY OF GOLDEN GATE PARK AND THE CEMETERIES

CHAPTER V

THEN AND NOW, OR EIGHTEEN HUNDRED FORTY-NINE AND NINETEEN HUNDRED AND ONE

CHAPTER VI

FROM STREET NOMENCLATURE TO A CANNON

CHAPTER VII

CHINAMEN OF SAN FRANCISCO—THEIR CALLINGS AND CHARACTERISTICS

CHAPTER VIII

A CHINESE NEWSPAPER, LITTLE FEET, AND AN OPIUM-JOINT

CHAPTER IX

MUSIC, GAMBLING, EATING, THEATRE-GOING

CHAPTER X

THE JOSS-HOUSE, CHINESE IMMIGRATION AND CHINESE THEOLOGY

CHAPTER XI

THE GENERAL CONVENTION OF 1901

CHAPTER XII

THROUGH THE CITY TO THE GOLDEN GATE

CHAPTER I

WESTWARD

Choice of Route—The Ticket—Journey Begun—Pan-American Exposition
and President McKinley—The Cattle-Dealer and His Story—Horses—Old
Friends—The Father of Waters—Two Noted Cities—Rocky Mountains—A
City Almost a Mile High—The Dean and His Anti-tariff Window—Love
and Revenge—Garden of the Gods—Haunted House—Grand Cañon and Royal
Gorge—Arkansas River—In Salt Lake City—A Mormon and His Wives—The
Lake—Streets—Tabernacle and Temple—In St. Mark's—Salt Lake
Theatre—Impressions—Ogden—Time Sections—Last Spike—Piute
Indians—El Dorado—On the Sierras—A Promised Land.

The meeting of the General Convention of the Church in San Francisco, in 1901, gave the writer the long-desired opportunity to visit the Pacific coast and see California, which since the early discoveries, has been associated with adventure and romance. Who is there indeed who would not travel towards the setting sun to feast his eyes on a land so famous for its mineral wealth, its fruits and flowers, and its enchanting scenery from the snowy heights of the Sierras to the waters of the ocean first seen by Balboa in 1513, and navigated successively by Magalhaes and Drake, Dampier and Anson?

The question, debated for weeks before setting out on the journey, was, which route of travel will I take? It is hard to choose where all are excellent. I asked myself again and again, which line will afford the greatest entertainment and be most advantageous in the study of the country from a historic standpoint? The Canadian Pacific route, and also the Northern Pacific, with their grand mountainous scenery and other attractions, had much to commend them; so also other lines of importance like the Santa Fé with its connecting roads; and the only regret was that one could not travel over them all. But one way had to be selected, and the choice at last fell on the Delaware and Hudson, the Erie, Rock Island, the Denver and Rio Grande, and the Southern Pacific roads. This route was deemed most feasible, and one that would give a special opportunity to pass through cities and places famous in the history of the Nation, which otherwise could not be visited without great expense and consumption of time. It enabled one also to travel through such great States as Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada, as well as central California. As the return journey had also to be determined before leaving home, the writer, desirous of visiting the coast towns of California south of San Francisco, and as far down as San Diego, the first settlement in California by white men, arranged to take the Southern Pacific Railway and the direct lines with which it communicates. In travelling over the "Sunset Route," as the Southern Pacific is styled, he would pass across the southern section of California from Los Angeles, through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and Louisiana, the line over which President McKinley travelled when he made his tour in the spring of 1901. From New Orleans, by taking the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, he would journey through southern Mississippi, Tennessee, Kentucky, and so back through Ohio from Cincinnati, and across Pennsylvania into the Empire State, over the Erie and the "D. & H." Railways. By the "Sunset Route," too, the writer could avail himself of the privilege of going into the country of Mexico at Eagle Pass, and so down to the City of Mexico, famous with the memories of the Montezumas and of Cortez and