George A. Crufutt, American Progress, n.d.; chromolithograph after an 1872 painting by John Gast; courtesy CSU Bakersfield. “American Progress” is depicted as a fair-haired woman who is leading the Americans west. She guides and protects miners, farmers, covered wagons, railroads, and even a stage coach, displacing Indian families and the buffalo of the Great Plains. She is stringing the transcontinental telegraph cable wire with one hand and holds a book in the other.

California Becomes a Destination

By 1820 many people had come to California to seek their fortune. In 1841 the first U.S. emigrants made their way here from the Midwest by covered wagon. Most of these newcomers settled inland from the coast and the missions. With each new arrival, more native tribes were forced from their ancestral lands. At the same time, competition for land and resources was beginning to grow among all who had settled in California.

The struggle for control of California was already underway when gold was discovered in 1848. As news of the discovery began to spread, the world rushed to California as never before.


Contested Territory

Between 1820 and 1850, control of California would move from Spain to Mexico to the United States. In 1821, Mexico won independence from Spain after a 10-year war. Following the conflict, California changed in important ways. The missions were removed from church ownership and the presidios fell into disrepair. As a result, the vast rancheros and the growing pueblos of Los Angeles, San Jose, and Sonoma soon became the center of life in California. But the Mexican government was finding it difficult to manage its far northern territories, which included New Mexico and Texas as well as California.

The U.S. attempted to purchase California and Texas from Mexico, but the Mexican government resisted, and the U.S. declared war on Mexico in 1846. Two years later the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed, ending the war and giving the U.S undisputed control of the present-day states of California, Nevada, and Utah, and parts of Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming.

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