[PDF] Wells Fargo Messenger eBook

Author : Oliver Roberts De La Fontaine
Publisher : Pickle Partners Publishing
Page : 466 pages
File Size : 34,98 MB
Release : 2018-03-12
Category : Biography & Autobiography
ISBN : 1789121019

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This is the true life story of Oliver Roberts de La Fontaine, who was the last of the Wells Fargo Shotgun express messengers. Taken from his notes and journals, the book tells of his days in the early West as a rancher, miner, saloon keeper, gambler, and lawman, including his adventures of coming into contact with stage robbers and other lawless persons in California and Nevada. Later in life, Roberts de la Fontaine came to “The Walter Method,” referring to its promulgator—and compiler of this book—William W. Walter as the “Great Understander.” “In arranging and compiling this true-life story, especial care has been taken to preserve the original wording of the narrative. No attempt has been made to embellish, enlarge or exaggerate the many thrilling experiences related by Mr. de La Fontaine. On the contrary, it is known to me that many of the experiences were far more dangerous and thrilling than explained in the diary, but Mr. de La Fontaine was as modest and good as he was brave and fearless.”

Author : Philip L. Fradkin
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
Page : 274 pages
File Size : 25,29 MB
Release : 2002-04-24
Category : History
ISBN : 074322762X

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Sweeping in scope, as revealing of an era as it is of a company, Stagecoach is the epic story of Wells Fargo and the American West, by award-winning writer Philip L. Fradkin. The trail of Wells Fargo runs through nearly every imaginable landscape and icon of frontier folklore: the California Gold Rush, the Pony Express, the transcontinental railroad, the Civil and Indian Wars. From the Great Plains to the Rockies to the Pacific Ocean, the company's operations embraced almost all social, cultural, and economic activities west of the Mississippi, following one of the greatest migrations in American history. Fortune seekers arriving in California after the discovery of gold in 1849 couldn't bring the necessities of home with them. So Wells Fargo express offices began providing basic services such as the exchange of gold dust for coin, short-term deposits and loans, and reliable delivery and receipt of letters, money, and goods to and from distant places. As its reputation for speed and dependability grew, the sight of a red-and-yellow Wells Fargo stagecoach racing across the prairie came to symbolize not only safe passage but faith in a nation's progress. In fact, for a time Wells Fargo was the most powerful and widespread institution in the American West, even surpassing the presence of the federal government. Stagecoach is a fascinating and rare combination of Western and business history. Along with its colorful association with the frontier -- Wyatt Earp, Black Bart, Buffalo Bill -- readers will discover that swiftness, security, and connectivity have been constants in Wells Fargo's history, and that these themes remain just as important today, 150 years later.

Author : Robert Joseph Chandler
Publisher : Arcadia Publishing
Page : 130 pages
File Size : 31,56 MB
Release : 2006
Category : History
ISBN : 9780738531434

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Those striking images of stagecoaches traversing rugged mountain terrain are no mere marketing gimmick, but part and parcel of Wells Fargo's storied past. When Henry Wells and William Fargo founded the company in 1852, the gold rush had already brought thousands of people to California and uncovered the largest amount of wealth then known to the world. Wells Fargo served a unique role as a banking, express or transporting, and mail-delivery agency. In 1857, the company helped establish the Overland Mail Company; in 1861, it operated the Pony Express; and in 1866, it put together a 3,000-mile network of stagecoaches running between California and Nebraska. Three decades later, Wells Fargo covered the nation over a web of iron rails. Miners and merchants, ranchers and farmers alike depended on Wells Fargo. The company always used the fastest means possible for its deliveries and fund transfers, whether by riverboat, ocean steamer, pony express, stagecoach, railroad, or the fastest method of all, the telegraph.

Author : Ralph Moody
Publisher : U of Nebraska Press
Page : 188 pages
File Size : 37,20 MB
Release : 2005-01-01
Category : History
ISBN : 9780803283039

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Presents the story of how Henry Wells and William Fargo went into express mail business in California and stopped the Post Office monopoly during the nineteenth century.

Author : Edward Hungerford
Publisher : New York, Random House [1949]
Page : 322 pages
File Size : 32,25 MB
Release : 1949
Category : Banks and banking
ISBN :

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The turbulent history of a great western enterprise that began during the gold strike of '49 operated its mails on the pony express, pioneered daring stagecoarch lines, and todya prospers in American banking and transportation.

Author : James B. Hume
Publisher : McFarland
Page : 283 pages
File Size : 27,51 MB
Release : 2010-03-08
Category : History
ISBN : 0786456248

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In January 1, 1885, Wells, Fargo & Company's chief detective James B. Hume and special agent John N. Thacker published a report summarizing the company's losses during the previous 14 years. It listed 313 stagecoach robberies, 23 burglaries, and four train robberies but included little or no details of the events themselves, focusing instead on physical descriptions of the robbers. Widely circulated, the report was intended to assist law enforcement in identifying and apprehending the criminals believed still to present a danger to the company. The present volume revisits each crime, updating Hume and Thacker's original report with rich new details culled from local newspapers, personal diary entries, and court records.