12. What do you know of Niagara Falls and the power plants on both sides of the Niagara River?
[SAN FRANCISCO]
The United States extends from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and just as New York is our leading seaport on the Atlantic, so San Francisco is the leading seaport on the Pacific.
San Francisco's history is inseparably connected with the development of the resources of California. In 1769 Spain sent an expedition overland from Mexico to colonize the Pacific coast, and Don Gaspar de Portolá, at the head of these colonists, was the first white man known to have looked upon San Francisco Bay.
Seven years later, in 1776, the Franciscan friars built a fortified settlement on the present site of San Francisco. The Mission Dolores, which is still standing, was begun the same year, and a little village slowly grew up around it.
At the close of the Mexican War, in 1848, California was ceded to the United States, and the Stars and Stripes were raised over the little settlement, whose name was soon changed from Yerba Buena to San Francisco.
In 1848, too, came the discovery of gold in California, and San Francisco suddenly grew from a Spanish village to a busy American town. The population jumped from 800 to 10,000 in a single year. A city of tents and shanties quickly arose on the sand dunes. Thousands of people were leaving their homes in the East to seek a fortune in the gold fields. Many came by water, either rounding Cape Horn or else traveling by boat to the Isthmus of Panama, crossing on foot, and reëmbarking on the Pacific coast. Others came overland in large canvas-covered wagons called prairie schooners.