The Sacramento Bee from Sacramento, California • 54

First came the broad beamed packet And then the hardy creaking Conestoga Then came the thin tired Concord stage And finally the huffing hissing Iron Horse I Uirkitf rtfrnn thr acmfueuh taut uthrkitt thrtr martnuut It was a strange uncharted river that John A Sutter negotiated in his trip up the Sacramento to found his long dreamed New Helvetia After loading at Yerba Buena it took him nine days just to find a passage through the maze of waterways in the river delta But as man later began to chart the river the passage time was shaved until finally a brig could make the trip in five days Then came the Whiton the bark destined to become first postoffice It astounded the Californian of that day by making the passage in 72 hours The river had been conquered Then when the cry of gold echoed throughout the world the Argonauts loaded the sturdy Conestoga and formed long wagon trains following first the familiar Oregon Trail then turning southward along the overland coast route to Sacramento Finally Caleb Greenwood still a trail blazer at 81 found a path over the Sierra via the Truckee River The mountains had been bridged Once the new valley city was settled the Concord stage was introduced It ran regular schedules to the mine camps and when highwaymen began to waylay coaches in the isolated mountain canyons armed shotgun riders were assigned to protect passengers and gold A new day was dawning V1 $1 if 4" i i ft? XM 4 whnnQth mromt ttUum nfllir ihtiMt hvf ettte til Finally the east and west seaboards were connected by rail when the Central Pacific and the Union Pacific Railroads met at Promontory Utah in May 1869 The Central Pacific had built out of Sacramento ignoring the warning of San Francisco editors who ridiculed as a reckless dream the ambitious plan to gouge a railbed over the Sierra Sacramento had kicked off its swaddling clothes New York was only seven days away by rail 9 a Xj "JH iff f's -if is 1 fii' Vv 4 4 If 1 tv tttf 'iucmuituto Uy (mm (be frrfl bpttk The time had come when mariners had learned the wily routes of the Sacramento River when these sketches published in 1850 in Cadwalader Chart of the Sacramento were drawn In sequence from the top the drawings depict the: (1) Tongue Shoal landmark and Mount Diablo off the south shores of Suisun Bay on the journey up-4 stream to Sacramento (2) the passage by the Chain Islands and the Montezuma Hills to the north (3) the confluence of the Sacramento at its forks upstream (4) the delta passage known then as Middle Fork and (5) a view of Sacramento 1850 At times as many as 40 ships crowded the river harbor their masts jutting tall and proud against the skyline Some Argonauts walked to the mine fields from Sacramento then the stepping stone for the Sierra diggings Others traveled with heavily provisioned wagons Still others rode horseback or led patient pack burros Page CC-18 THE SACRAMENTO BEE MONDAY FEBRUARY 25 1957 Sacramento California.