2649

Weekly Stock Circular, San Francisco Stock & Exchange Board, 1864

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Mining Start Price:500.00 USD Estimated At:1,000.00 - 1,500.00 USD
Weekly Stock Circular, San Francisco Stock & Exchange Board, 1864
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Extremely rare; the earliest issue in the Bancroft is dated Dec. 10, 1864. Fine condition with small missing pieces not effecting content. By the Associated Brokers of the San Francisco Stock and Exchange Board. Datelined San Francisco Saturday Evening February 27th 1864. An early publication of the San Francisco Stock and Exchange Board just a short time after its founding in September of 1862. A four-page circular printed on light white stock. The first page was authored by Robert C. Page of R. C. Page & Co., a stock broker and one of the charter members of the Exchange with offices at 709 Montgomery Street. It covers a brief summary of the financial markets followed a more detailed review of activity in specific Mining Stocks along with news from the significant companies such as the Gould & Curry, Ophir, Empire Mill and Mining, Uncle Sam and the North American in the Comstock and the Real del Monte in Aurora. This latter mine was involved in a fight with the Pond Mining Company over mining claims to the rich, Last Chance Hill. Both companies hired gunmen to intimidate the other side and to keep witnesses from testifying against their companies in court. The Pond Mining Co. hired the Infamous Daly gang, some of whom were lynched along with their leader, John Daly, by a vigilante group some weeks before this circular was published.

The second page lists the “Sales of Stock for the Week Ending February 27th” day by day. Much activity is reflected for the Real del Monte, and the Comstock mines: Lady Bryan, North Potosi, and North American.

The third page has a section entitled “Fluctuations in Leading Mining Shares for the past six months” and lists 30 mining stocks and their prices. Two other sections status bonds and other non-mining stocks.

The fourth page lists detailed statistics for “Mining Stocks” reflecting: No. of feet in mine, shares per foot, total number of shares, incorporated value, Bid and Asked per foot, last monthly dividend, recent assessments per foot and total assessment per foot. The mines are grouped by region: Washoe District, 49 mines; Esmeralda District, 11; Coso District, 4; Humboldt District, 2; Reese River District, 14; Mexico, 5; and Misc. 5.

The San Francisco Stock and Exchange Board was formed on September 11th, 1862 modeled after the New York and London Stock Exchanges for the purpose of controlling much of the speculation in the recently discovered Comstock Mines. It was the first mining exchange in the United States. It is interesting to note that Joseph King remarks in his History that the Stock Circular was first published in August of 1864 (see page 31), however this issue predates that by over six months. According to King it was continued issued until Jan. 1, 1870. Earlier transactions of the exchange had been published in the San Francisco Bulletin. The Initial forty members were quickly dubbed The Forty Thieves after the Arabian Nights’, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, by that element of the city that took a dim view of gambling in Washoe Stocks. In 1864 the total transactions amounted to a staggering $45 million. The San Francisco board was quickly followed by others in or closer to the mining camps, but they proved merely tributary to the central market in the city. Within a year of the Exchange’s founding, the Mining and Scientific Press listed thirteen hundred mining companies, most of them fraudulent. Get-rich-quick speculation became virtually synonymous with life in the West. The Exchange pooled and channeled capital from the United States and Europe, then directed it against lucrative targets wherever and whatever they might be, making possible prodigious leaps in mining technology that could readily be adapted to every other industry. By the mid-1870s, it was the world’s leading exchange devoted to mining.

References: Financial California – The Rise of commercial Banking by Le Roy Armstrong, J. O. Denny 1916 and Imperial San Francisco Urban Power, Earthly Ruin by Gray Brechin. Also see California Studies in Critical Human Geography, 3, Chapter 1 – THE PYRAMID OF MINING, University of California Press

Location: San Francisco, California HWAC# 57604