Currier lithograph mocking the rush to California
1849
A comic print published by Nathaniel Currier in the first year of the gold rush, showing the far-fetched means by which hopefuls proposed to reach California, rockets among them. It belongs to the Library of Congress collection of popular graphic arts and is one of the period's best-known satires on gold fever.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
Part of San Francisco · Watch in the documentary