Norms Formation: The California Gold Rush and Women’s Roles
Sandra Aguilar- Gomez, Anja Benshaul-Tolonen
The population in San Francisco in 1860 counted 12 men for every woman. The gender imbalance in the population did not disappear completely until several decades later. Most commonly, the reason for the sex imbalance was gold mining, which initially attracted predominantly male migrants. The Gold Rush however created a vibrant economy with cash rich miners looking for services such as housekeeping, lodging, washing, cooking, and company, which was usually provided by wives. Historic accounts from surviving correspondences and diaries, suggest that early female migrants who often traveled with their husbands started as miners, but quickly turned to the service sector as the work in the mining sector intensified, and services became more lucrative (Levy, 1990). Soon women from around the country, and even all the way from Europe, were arriving in the San Francisco bay to gain from the income opportunities that cash rich gold miners were generating. The stories told by women in the Gold Rush indicate that an entrepreneurial woman could earn more than the miners she was cooking, washing or sewing for (Levy, 1990, Taniguchi, 2000). However, the selection bias in these stories may be significant. The stories may fail to be representative of the experiences that most women lived in the Gold Rush as they are predominantly from written accounts. For instance, in 1850 almost all of the literate women were white - their rate of illiteracy was 6\% compared to 56\% among black women.
Event: Annual World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty 2019
Only personal, non-commercial use of this document is allowed.