William Chapman Ralston, Tycoon
One of the first men to build a major
financial empire in the Far West, Ralston was born in Ohio in 1826. In 1854, he
immigrated to the booming town of San Francisco, a once sleepy Spanish
missionary village that had become the center of the California Gold Rush five
years earlier. There he became a partner in a steamship company, and 10 years
later he used his profits to organize the Bank of California.
Ralston’s bank quickly became one of the most
important financial institutions in the West. Starved for capital, western
businessmen were happy to deal with a reliable bank in their own region instead
of the New York and Boston banks. Ralston committed his own funds as well as
those of the bank to a wide array of western businesses. Many were unexciting
but essential enterprises like water companies. Ralston also had an adventurous
side, though, and used his money to support lavish hotels and theaters in San
Francisco as well as the hugely profitable Comstock Lode silver mine in Nevada.
William Ralston's "Summer Home" In Belmont, CA Where His Wife And Children Lived Year Round
The always-treacherous world of mining,
however, eventually proved to be Ralston’s undoing. Having made millions in the
Comstock Lode, Ralston gambled on several silver mines that proved busts. News
of the failed mining investments sparked a run on the bank, forcing the bank to
close its doors on August 26, 1875.
The next day, a somber board of directors
asked for and received Ralston’s resignation as bank president. A few hours
later, after Ralston had gone for his usual morning swim in San Francisco Bay,
his body was discovered. Whether Ralston had accidentally drowned or
deliberately killed himself remains a mystery.
In Recent Culture
Ralston was portrayed by Ronald W. Reagan in a
1965 episode of Death Valley Days, "Raid on the San Francisco Mint."
The episode dramatizes an 1869 event in which Ralston gets the head of the mint
drunk in order to persuade him to authorize an exchange of bullion for coins.
Vaughn Taylor was cast as financier and adventurer Asbury Harpending.
*Images from PeoplePill and Wikipedia
Prairie Rose Publications
BY SARAH MCNEAL
Buy Link: THE
WILDINGS
THE
WILDINGS is a wonderful
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Sarah J. McNeal
Author
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