[Jewelry making - Article 00869] - [Orchid] [Tidbits] The Wheelbarrow Men of the Gold Rush Days

[Benjamin Mark]

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    The Wheelbarrow Men of the Gold Rush Days 

    The Gold Rush created many great fortunes. Aside from its use in
    jewelry...gold from those days created the very impetus which
    led to the establishment of many American great fortunes. There 
    was no end to the way enterprising men...and women...some
    honest...some not so honest...made money. There were the ladies
    of the day...who sold their favors to men tired from their
    labors. There were bunco artists...who salted fresh digging with
    sprinklings of gold dust in order to finalize their sales. And
    there was the high cost of living created by vendors in the
    Sierras...who sold sacks of flour for $100.00 a pop.  Shovels
    and pans...same price. Cats...ten bucks a head and the supply
    could not keep up with the demand in the rat plagued towns where
    the prospectors came to try their luck. 

    Among the now famous names like Levi Strauss--I wrote about him
    in a past article--and Armour--the butcher--whose empires were
    launched in the towns of the gold rush days...there was
    another...a young man known for making wheelbarrows. He was one
    of five brothers...and I suspect there is barely  a person alive
    today who does not know his name. I'll tell you a bit about him
    and his family. You see if you can figure out who he is before
    the end of this Tidbits. 

    Aside from wheelbarrows...the brothers five...starting off as
    blacksmiths...also made wagons. One of them...Clement by
    name...was--for a while--a school teacher in South Bend,
    Indiana. The brothers opened an office in St. Joseph, Mo. in
    order to outfit settlers moving west. They were successful on
    their own in any man's language. But the days of the gold rush
    were instrumental in the financing of their empires. I would
    venture to say there was not a prospector alive who was not in
    need of a wheelbarrow...whether to carry off  the debris he
    shoveled or the gold he found. 

    Our wheelbarrow men went on to get government contracts for their
    wagons...and when the wagons they produced--a total of 750,000
    units--went by the way of the horse and buggy as the automobile
    forged a path to the forefront of American business...our
    wheelbarrow makers...whose fortunes had been
    established...indirectly and partially because of gold... tried
    their hand at manufacturing automobiles too. Their names
    were--have you guessed it yet folks...their names
    were...Studebaker...giants in their time...and--I believe--still
    today leaders and innovators of what I think was and is one of
    the prettiest sports cars around: The Avanti. 

 
And there ya have it.
That's it for this week folks.
Catch you all next week.
Benjamin Mark
 

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