Last Bonanza Kings: The Bourns of San Francisco - Softcover

Egan, Ferol

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0874177863 ISBN 13: 9780874177862

Publisher: University of Nevada Press, 2009

Synopsis

Much of the wealth from the great mining bonanzas of the nineteenth century American West flowed into San Francisco and made possible the growth of the city and some fabulous personal fortunes. Among the wealthiest and most powerful of the Bonanza Kings were William Bowers Bourn I and his son and successor, William Bowers Bourn II. Their wealth came from rich mines in Nevada’s Comstock Lode and Treasure Hill and California’s Sierra foothills, as well as astute business ventures in the booming port city of San Francisco. Last Bonanza Kings tells their story with all the colorful detail and sweeping sense of epic drama that the characters and their times demand, setting them into the turbulent context of an age of rampant financial and civic growth, major technological advances in mining, lavish philanthropy, and opulent personal lifestyles.

About this title

From the Publisher:

Award-winning author, Ferol Egan, has written six books. In 1986, Egan gained access to the correspondence and papers of the Bourn family. In this book, he brings well-deserved attention to an overlooked dynasty in California history.

From the Back Cover:

While the great mining bonanzas of the nineteenth-century West made eastern California and Nevada the subject of legend, much of the wealth from the mines flowed to San Francisco and made possible the growth of the city and some fabulous personal fortunes. Among the wealthiest and most powerful of the Bonanza Kings was William Bowers Bourn I and his son and successor, William Bowers Bourn II. The elder Bourn, descendant of an early New England family, arrived in San Francisco shortly after the discovery of gold in the Sierra foothills. Although he eventually invested heavily in mines in Grass Valley and on the Comstock, his initial success was as a businessman in the booming port city. The younger Bourn built upon his fathers success, expanding the Empire Mine in Grass Valley into one of the largest, most productive, and most technologically advanced hard-rock gold mines in the West, acquiring additional mining properties on the Comstock and on Treasure Hill in eastern Nevada, and developing a range of business ventures, including a vast water system that was to become the basis for San Francisco's present water supply. Like many other wealthy men of his generation, William Bourn II was a generous donor to worthy causes and an enthusiastic patron of the arts, supporting such projects as the San Francisco Symphony, the Panama Pacific International Exposition of 1915, the construction of the present quarters of the Pacific Union Club, and the creation of his own final home, Filoli, a vast Italianate estate on the Peninsula south of San Francisco.

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Nevada Press
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0874177863
• ISBN 13: 9780874177862
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 312