California Republic: Intro and Contents

Tales from the Origins of Los Angeles and San Francisco

Oct 15, 2024

Introduction to California Republic

California is on its way, perhaps three hundred years from now, to a flowering of civilization surpassing all the world has known. Los Angeles will be its Rome, and its Florence will be San Francisco. All great cultures have been nurtured by a legendary history, defined by some heroic characters and polished into marble by much later generations. Here I offer, after decades of reflection, such heroic figures from the birth of San Francisco and the conquest of Los Angeles, in the decade from the Gold Rush Forty-Niners to the nation's Civil War.

I speak of "legendary history." The backdrop of events presented here is fact, as are the large events for every character. But it's impossible to build a proper story for these characters without the liberties of fiction. No one really knows the motives of Jack Powers, for example, and the contemporary takes of Broderick and Belle Cora cannot possibly be reconciled. Thus the spirit of the period presented here is history, although the close details of character are fiction. A very standard practice since Will Shakespere gave the reigns of the Plantagenets to England.

All the fiction has been written as a unit, conceived for reading start to close. The reader should start reading, therefore, from the opening, in the Post to follow this one. Although divided into separate blocks, pursuing different storylines, they were fashioned to accumulate. Some things may make little sense without the knowledge of preceding chapters. I’m in the process of adding a series of Historical Footnotes that are pure history, not fiction, and may be useful in filling out the picture.

There will never be a charge for reading this. It's my gift to California, where I was born and have lived out my entire life. I have always been inspired by the artist Simon Rodia, who raised up towers of imagination on 107th Street in Watts as a gift to his Los Angeles, and then simply walked away. Centuries from now, when no one yet recalls a real estate promotion sign atop the hills of Hollywood, his masterpiece will still be treasured and, perhaps, appreciated fully by a finer culture than we know right now.

I dedicate this work to Harold Chapler, who never knew he made it possible. And to Mitch, who was my own Jack Powers.