Flappers & Fiction

“California was first the treasury, then the garden spot of the world.” This 1900 chronicle explores the massive shift from the gold rush to the era of grain. We travel from the fading adobe homes of displaced Spanish families to the colossal wheat fields where the “rancher is king.” It is a vivid tour of a changing landscape where the romance of the old hacienda clashes with the strange efficiency of the combined harvester. From the tragic loss of ancestral estates to the “island princess” luxury of the Baldwin ranch, this is the story of how the West was really won.