PBA Galleries

Hand-colored lithograph, with gum arabic. 32x21.8 cm (12½x8½") on sheet 43.8x33 cm (17¼x13").

OCLC/WorldCat lists only one example of this issue, published by Kellogg & Comstock, with D. Needham in Buffalo listed as co-publisher, at the American Antiquarian Society. There are also listed three copies of an issue published by N. Currier or Currier & Ives. One of the Currier listings is in the National Library of Australia, and their lengthy, and rich, description reads in part: "The 'gold hunter' is a well dressed man, laden with gold mining tools, scales, link sausages, fish and a pot for a hat. In the background a road sign reads: 'To St Louis 350 miles. To California 1700 miles'. The 'gold hunter' is wearing the trade marks of the California digger - the thigh length boots, the colt navy pistol and bowie knife. The discovery of gold on January 24, 1848 by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill, in Coloma, California started the beginning of the Californian Gold Rush. The discovery of gold in California, closely followed by the discovery in Australia, attracted thousands of miners and their families resulting in an influx of people and wealth to both countries and dramatically changing their societies and environments. The coverage of the Gold rush was a popular story in America, Australia and England as many people were keen to discover their fortune on the gold fields too..."