H69.26.6

Notice. Description: "NOTICE!" Frank Lightston, Nov. 11th, 1861. ...All persons on the Ranch of San Miguel, in Contra Costa County, are hereby notified not to commit any waste by cutting or destroying any timber of any kind on said ranch...etc. From the History Information Station: Object: Broadside to "Persons of San Miguel in Contra Costa County" forbidding timber cutting. Dated November 11, 1861. History: Aside from the population growth throughout the Bay Area in the 1850s, several disastrous fires levelled San Francisco, making it necessary to rebuild from the ground up. The demand for lumber was high. As the woods near San Francisco and on the peninsula disappeared, loggers moved to the East Bay. As this notice suggests, they were not always aware of private property lines. This notice and others like it would have been posted around the Rancho San Miguel. By 1861 the rough and tumble days of the Gold Rush and the vigilance committees were long past. Established settlers expected the legal system to maintain law and order, including the protection of property rights, just as it did in the eastern United States. Museum Purchase