A History of the City of San Francisco: And Incidentally of the State of California. E-book. Formato PDF John S. Hittell   -  Forgotten Books, 2017  - 

This book was written at the request of the committee appointed to manage the celebration in San Francisco of the Centennial Anniversary of the Declaration of our National Independence, in accordance with a resolution adopted by Congress on the thirteenth of March, 1876, recommending that in every town the delivery of a historical sketch of the place from its foundation should be part of the local celebration. It was considered better that, instead of a brief sketch to be read publicly in an hour, the metropolis on the American coast of the North Pacific should have a book of several hundred pages. The city furnishes material enough for a history which could never be prepared on a more appropriate occasion than in commemoration of the National Centennial year, especially since it happens to coincide with the completion of the first century in the existence of our city. Such a double epoch demanded some special mark of recognition.There are urgent reasons why works of this kind should be written by pioneers, and while there are still hundreds of pioneers living to furnish information from their personal reminiscences and from papers that will be lost when they die.

The Adventures of James Capen Adams, Mountaineer Adams Grizzly Bear Hunter of California. E-book. Formato PDF Theodore H. Hittell   -  Forgotten Books, 2017  - 

In the midst of this strange menagerie was Adams, the proprietor — quite as strange as any of his animals. He was a man a little over medium size, muscular and wiry, with sharp features and penetrating eyes. He was apparently about fifty years of age; but his hair was very gray and his beard very white. He was dressed in coat and pantaloons of buckskin, fringed at the edges and along the seams of arms and legs. On his head he wore a cap of deerskin, ornamented with a fox-tail, and on his feet buckskin moccasins. An excellent likeness of him, as well as of his favorite bear, is presented in the illustration, drawn from life by Charles Nahl, entitled Adams and Ben Franklin.