Personal Memoranda: Samuel Hopkins Willey: The Journal of His Voyage to California, 1848-1849
By Samuel Hopkins Willey
Edited by James M. Spitze
In mid November of 1848, a 27-year-old Congregational Minister was "informed" by the American Board for Home Missions that he had been called to California and was to board a steamer leaving from New York City on December 1st. Less than three months later, on February 23, 1849, the Rev. Dr. Samuel Hopkins Willey stepped ashore in Monterey from the steamer California. From that moment till his death sixty-five years later, Sam Willey was a leading force in the founding of our state's educational structure. The institutions that he helped to found include today's San Francisco Public School System, Mills College, The Hamlin School, and — certainly his supreme achievement — The University of California.
For over a hundred years, the Bancroft Library has possessed both his on-the-spot diary of the voyage on the steamer California and a much longer recollection (written in 1877) of his entire trip to California — first on the steamer Fulton, then on canoe and mule-back across the Isthmus of Panama, and then via the steamer California up the coast to Monterey. The recollection ends with a wonderful description of his first several months in Monterey, mentioning the many now famous people he worked with — Mariano Guadalupe Vallejo, William Tecumseh Sherman, and thirty or so more.
Our Friends Keepsake 52 publishes for the first time these two fascinating documents along with an extensive introduction and numerous period illustrations — all from the Bancroft Library's collections. Surely, our Keepsake is a long overdue tribute to Cal's long-forgotten founder.
To purchase a copy of our non-Keepsake soft cover version, please visit the Bancroft Store