On March 9, 1842, ranchero Francisco López awoke hungry from a tree-shaded siesta. Digging up some onions to snack on, he got a glittering surprise — gold flakes.
The rest, as they say, is history. The find set off a small gold rush in Placerita Canyon, then part of Mexican California — six years before James Marshall’s celebrated discovery at Sutter’s Mill. In this field-trip video, we take a brief look at this lesser-known “birthplace of the Golden State.”
Transcript
0:01 We've all heard the saying, "there's gold in them thar hills." But what about these here onions? Let's take a field trip.
0:08 [Music]
0:12 Hidden in the rolling hills of Placerita Canyon, our destination is an unusual piece of SoCal history located on the former Rancho San Francisco: the Oak of the Golden Dream.
0:26 [Music]
0:36 This quiet path was once the backdrop for a legendary event. On March 9th, 1842, when California was still a part of Mexico, Ranchero Francisco Lopez stumbled upon gold while napping under this very tree.
0:52 [Music]
0:53 As the story goes, with his cattle grazing nearby, Lopez dreamed he was floating on butter. When he woke up, he was hungry. So he pulled some wild onions from the ground with his knife.
1:04 And lo and behold, on their roots were gold flakes. Lopez had made California's first-ever recorded gold discovery. And it started a sort of mini gold rush here in the canyon, complete with small-scale mining operations. And all this took place six years before the more famous gold discovery up north at Sutter's Mill.
1:23 So if you ever want to visit the true birthplace of the Golden State, take a detour through Placerita Canyon, step back in time, and see what you can discover.
1:34 I'm Michael Imlay, and thanks for joining me on this Backstory field trip.