Gold Rush Era Collections

PS I want you to keep our affairs to yourselve that is the quartz

San Francisco Dec 15th 1851 Dear Brother

I wrote to you with reference to some machinery for a flouring establishment & custom work. I am stronger of the opinion every day that it will be a good investment and so is Mr Craft. there is men calling at the place that I am at work at now to get wheat floured but there is nothing in town to do it. I have been talking Mr Craft today about it. he thinks that we can get an engine here about as cheap as to send home for it. and I am aftaid that you could not build the engine and the rest of the necessary machinery as quick as it ought to be done in order to get it here in season for the next crop of grain. there are several engines and boilers here and on the way here at the present time and the most of them are calculated for quartz mining and no doubt there is some of them that will not be used for that purpose there is a large quantity of quartz machinery sent here that is not worth much more than the iron is worth to melt again. I never should advise any man to send machinery here for quartz mining at present. I will send the papers and you can see from what there is

said in them that, that business does not pay at present and I fear it will not verry soon there is one great trouble in the boilers that are sent here, they are plain cylinder boilers I have not seen a flew [flue] boiler of any size there are some 8 and 10 horse engines with flue boilers. Now to the hill again I want you to write me as soon as you receive this what you can do, and if you can send the stuff . how soon it will be in N York ready to be shipped. and as soon as you can get up a draft of it send it to me so that I can get the location and building ready. Get it up as simple as possible I believe I wrote you what we thought best to get, that is, I [a ?] run of 4ft 8in in stones and one of Page & Prentess Portable mills, and a burnt mill or two with screan wire for the screams one or two corn crackers, calculate for two custom bolts and a flouring bolt. send the belting for the elivators and belts for all parts for it is not to be had here, and finally send every thing that will be necessary to set it to running. I want you to have these stones dressed before they are sent for you send this stuff I will be ready to grind in four weeks after it arrives here

You may send a good saw arbour and the casting for a good wood lathe and irons for a pulley mill. send cast iron brushes for the stones. I think that some of Boardman Boilers would be the thing for this country. at any rate in preferance to plain cylinder boilers. what is your ideas of them if you think best and you can get one of them of price in N York of suitable sure for what we want I think it would be best to get one. I do not want to be short of power if we do any thing. the bolt cloths can be made and sent by express the best way. you may send your letter by express in reply to this and I shall be sure to get it. send by Gregorys Express. now you see what I want and I wrote what I could do for it in my last letter. so I believe I have said all that is necessary at present I shall be anxious to hear from you on the subject. write me what the machinery for the mill will cost in N.Y. and also the bolt cloths and stones will cost. the cost also of a boiler such as I spoke of at Boardmans. be sure and send enough belting and elivator straps, for it cannot be got here.

you had better get Bussing or some body in N.Y. to get it freighted so as to get it through as cheap as possible Have it come on a clipper ship and it will come in about 3 months from NY be sure and write me as soon as possible so that we care now what to do it cannot be here to soon I received three letters by the last mail one from Olive and two from N [?] Boynton tell the boys to write to me it is now nine oclock P.M. and the mail closes at 10 so I must close. Jay is here with me and will stop here this winter. we have not had any rain of any account the withur is delightful my compliments to all in haste A. Conre Keesville N. York

234 & 235 Broadway New York Jany 1st 1852 A. Conre Esqu Dear Sir

Yours came to hand in due time & I would have answered immediately but we were verry busy moveing & I have not had a moment before to get the information you required. Enclosed you will find a card of prices for passage by the Nicaragua route - the other line by the Steamers Georgia & Ohio ranges about three dollars above the prices on the canal Exclusive of transportation across the Isthmus - These are th present prices - what they will be by the time your friends get ready to go I cannot say as they change almost every trip - [ ?] [ ?] ten or twelve persons will most probably go at half the above rates. Altho, you can get nothing positive from them in regard to it - You must make your arrangements with them and in the impulse of the moment They regard no proposition until they see the money in your fist - your

machinery will be taken at $50.00 per ton

These are present prices - it may be more or it may be less by the time you want to send as it depends altogether upon the quantity they have to ship -

Excuse haste as I am in a great hurry - Compliments to all

Yours Truly [ J H Ranson ?]

San Francisco Aug 30th 52 Dear Brother

As I did not write you by the last mail I thought I would write a few lines to let you know how I am geting along. I should have writen the last mail but I had nothing to write that would be interesting to you and I am no better off for news now than I was the last mail, but as Wolcott wrote to you then I thought it of no use, but as the boys are all away now I must write a few lines. I have been delaying writing in hopes that the mail would arrive from the states before this mail leaves. But to the subject I have not received any news from the mill as yet since the letter that you sent by Wolcott, except what Mary wrote to Wolcott in her letter she says that the mill is not shipped nor will not be untill you hear from me. I am verry sorry if it is so and cannot think it is so. although she could not be mystaken I presume Craft and myself have been examining all the manifests of shipping since the first of May last, and all the

mill or mills that we can find that are shipped up to the present time from N. York is one flouring mill that was shipped on the Josephine and she left N. York on the 25th of May, now out about 100 days I am in hopes that is the mill you have sent, but according to Mr [ ?] it is not so, if it was here or within 20 days of here we should be ready to put it to work within 30 day after its arrival, but as it stands I sure not make the first move. I have had several applications to sell it, and probably could have sold it to arrival if I had have had the bill of lading, therefore I could not make any calculations about it I am in hopes to hear more about it by the next arrival from home. it is a great disappointment to me as well as Craft and I think it must be to you. Craft has been doing little or nothing expecting that it would surely come. therefore did not invest his means so but what he could get them at short notice it is a considerable damage to him but not as much as myself

from the fact that, my leaving my work at Humboldt Bay to take care of the mill, and as a man cannot get a job in the city always when he wants it I have lost a considerable time and expense. it would take $1000.00 to make me good. as where I should have been had I have not came down from the bay, if we had the mill in operation now we could clear at least $300.00 per day for at least three months to come Flour is worth $25.00 and is expected it will be $30.00 in a day or two. what can be bought for from 3 to 4 cts p lb now as people are calculating to have a large wheat crop the next season, and there is a considerable talk about mills to grind it. wheat can be raised for $1.00 per bushel i Cal at the present prices of labour I am told by the farmers. I have not heard from Mould lately, but I think he will return home in the spring. I have not seen him at all [?] Flour has gone up to $30.00 per [bushel] today

I hope you will write every mail