California Romantic and Resourceful / A plea for the Collection, Preservation and Diffusion of Information Relating to Pacific Coast History

by John Francis Davis

Preface

This plea is an arrow shot into the air. It is the result of an address which I made at Colton Hall, in Monterey, upon the celebration of Admission Day, 1908, and another which I made at a luncheon meeting of the Commonwealth Club, at the Palace Hotel, San Francisco, on April 12, 1913. These addresses have been amplified and revised, and certain statistics contained in them have been brought down to the end of 1913. In this form they go forth to a larger audience, in the earnest hope that they may meet a kind reception, and somewhere find a generous friend.

The subject of Pacific Coast history is one of surpassing interest to Californians. Some fine additions to our store of knowledge have been made of late years, notably the treatise of Zoeth S. Eldredge on "The Beginnings of San Francisco," published by the author, in San Francisco, in 1912; the treatise of Irving Berdine Richman on "California under Spain and Mexico, 1535-1847," published by the Houghton Mifflin Company, of Boston and New York, in 1911; the warm appreciation of E. D. Baker, by Elijah R. Kennedy, entitled "The Contest for California in 1861," published by the Houghton Mifflin Company, in Boston and New York, in 1912; the monumental work on "Missions and Missionaries of California," by Fr. Zephyrin Engelhardt, published by the James H. Barry Company, of San Francisco, 1908-1913, and the "Guide to Materials for the History of the United States in the Principal Archives of Mexico," by Herbert E. Bolton, Ph. D., Professor of American History in the University of California, the publication of which by the Carnegie Institution of Washington, at Washington, D. C., in 1913, is an event of epochal historical importance. All of these works and the recent activities in Spain of Charles E. Chapman, the Traveling Fellow of the University of California, the publications of the Academy of Pacific Coast History, at Berkeley, edited by F. J. Teggart, and the forthcoming publication at San Francisco of "A Bibliography of California and the Pacific West," by Robert Ernest Cowan, only emphasize the importance of original research work in Pacific Coast history, and the necessity for prompt action to preserve the remaining sources of its romantic and inspiring story.

John F. Davis.
San Francisco, July 1, 1914.