PREFACE 



The purpose of this writing is to convey impres- 

 sions of the characters, qualities and activities of 

 California rural life and industries. It attempts to 

 sketch formative conditions both of natural situa- 

 tions and resources and of factors influencing local 

 individualism and sociology. It also presents, with 

 some detail of character and method, concrete agri- 

 cultural achievements which are unique in American 

 progress. Thus it is hoped to reveal the character- 

 istics of the rural life through which natural condi- 

 tions have been translated into industrial accomplish- 

 ment. 



Two reasons may be cited as justifying this effort. 

 First, it has not been hitherto undertaken in a com- 

 prehensive way. Second, California is so young that 

 more than two-thirds of the whole span of her life as 

 an American state have passed under the adult obser- 

 vation of the writer; and his knowledge of the pre- 

 ceding portion was chiefly derived from personal 

 acquaintance with those who had participated as 

 young men in its earliest enterprises and continued 

 their efforts for the upbuilding of the state for several 

 decades many of them enduring until the dawning 

 of the present century. 



E. J. WlCKSON. 



UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY, 

 May 1, 1922. 



