Cheryl Anne Stapp
A Day of Thanks
Two weeks from tomorrow, we celebrate our national Thanksgiving Day.
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California's Olden Golden Days
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Oct 163 min read
Spiritualism in the 19th Century
Its detractors said it was fraudulent; said it was some sort of diabolical magic. Said it was witchcraft. Nevertheless,...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Oct 25 min read
Kit Carson in California
Frontiersman Christopher “Kit” Carson—a legend in his own lifetime— was in California several times during its Mexican period, as a...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jul 313 min read
Calistoga's Spas Origins
For centuries, the Upper Napa Valley was home to several villages of indigenous people, hunter-gatherers who recognized the beneficial...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jul 31 min read
Independence Day 2024
Adopted by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence publicly announced to the world the decision...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jun 263 min read
First Transcontinental Railroad
Dropped into a pre-drilled hole and gently tapped into place, a 17.6-karat golden spike ceremoniously joined the Central Pacific Railroad...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
May 153 min read
The Camel Corps Experiment
It was May 1855, and U.S. Secretary of War Jefferson Davis had just realized a years-long goal, to establish an army “camel corps,” for...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Apr 173 min read
Alcatraz!
Its name is an Angelized version of an archaic Spanish word for “pelican,” although those birds no longer roost there. Since the mid-19th...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Dec 27, 20231 min read
New Year 2024
NEXT SUNDAY NIGHT WE BID FAREWELL TO 2023 AND WELCOME THE NEW YEAR 2024 IN FAMILIAR, TIME-HONORED WAYS: WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY, WE TOAST...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Oct 11, 20234 min read
Battle of Natividad
The Mexican-American War came to Pacific shores in July 1846, when U. S. Navy warships invaded the seaports at Monterey and San Francisco...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Sep 20, 20232 min read
Questionable Title
As early as 1850, San Francisco was firmly established as California’s premier commercial center, and its port the greatest maritime...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Sep 6, 20233 min read
The Barbary Coast
San Francisco’s infamous Barbary Coast began as Sydney-Town as early as mid-1849, so named for the glut of escaped or released men from...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Aug 16, 20232 min read
True Friend to Dogs
Ever since the westward migration of the 1840s and 1850s brought dogs in large numbers to California, stray and abandoned animals have...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Aug 9, 20233 min read
Animal Cruelty Curtailed
History books rarely say anything about it, but the pioneers who trekked overland in the 1840s seeking a better life in the West brought...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jul 26, 20233 min read
Canine Celebrities
In days long ago, San Francisco had a horrific stray dog problem as hordes of scrapping, feral mutts roamed the city unrestrained. Most...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jul 12, 20232 min read
Rise & Decline of Sutterville
It was supposed to be the realization of a dream: a dynamic new town laid out on a low bluff overlooking the Sacramento River, where a...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Jun 7, 20232 min read
The Works of H. H. Bancroft
Hubert Howe Bancroft is one of the most famous names in western America, as the man who became one of the first important and respected...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
May 24, 20234 min read
Island Goats
There were no animals of any kind on the rocky island when explorer Sebastian Vizcaino stopped there in 1602, naming it Santa Catalina in...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Apr 5, 20232 min read
Reality Check
California suffered its first painful economic readjustment in the mid-1850s, although the many reasons for it were not readily apparent...
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Cheryl Anne Stapp
Mar 29, 20232 min read
Policewoman Alice Stebbins Wells
Since the 1890s, California law enforcement agencies had employed women in caretaker positions—as matrons, supervisors, and other...
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