The Western Gate: A San Francisco Reader

Literary editor, and author of many books, Mr. Jackson has brought together a generous collection that gives a panoramic view of the most colorful of American towns. The book is in four sections: "Before the Gold", "The Gold Rush", "City in the Making" and "City of Our Times"; and takes the reader from the sleepy Spanish town of Yerba Buena to present-day San Francisco, the glamorous western gate of the continent. It reads as though it were an integrated history, as Mr. Jackson binds it together with an unusual selection of prose and poetry, fiction and fact. We find Bret Harte, of course; Stevenson and Bierce, Twain and London and Norris; but along with them are William Tecumseh Sherman, Anthony Trollope, John Charles Fremont, Emperor Norton I and selections from the almost unknown journals and diaries of Spanish padres, Russian traders and Yankee gold-seekers. This is Americana, but sharp, too, a fine gathering of super-reporters and intense observes. The Western Gate is the latest volume in the City and Country Readers Series.