Name/Title
Pacific Mail Steam Ship Company Shipping Receipt for bee hivesEntry/Object ID
A0236.3.11Scope and Content
Pacific Mail Steamship Company shipping receipt for materials (bee hives) shipped by Drake & Emerson onboard the Steamer Orizaba from San Francisco to San Diego
Historic Note:
The Pacific Mail Steamship Company was founded in 1848 by William Aspinwall of the firm of Howland and Aspinwall to execute a contract to carry mail from the Isthmus of Panama to the newly-annexed territory of California. Fortuitously for Aspinwall and his fellow investors, Pacific Mail was ideally positioned to cash in on the Gold Rush of 1849. As a result of this and the high quality of its service, the company became both an important part of the history of the American West as well as one of the most profitable enterprises of its era, with an annual return on investment that ran as high as 30%. Within five years of its inception, the company was running 18 steamers and it peaked at 23 in 1869. In that year, however, the completion of the transcontinental railroad foretold the end of the high profits of the Panama-California route. [The Ships List: The Fleets, (2007). http://www.theshipslist.com/ships/lines/pacificmail.htm (accessed January 21, 2009.)]Collection
Historic Maritime Documents (18th - early 20th C) CollectionLexicon
Nomenclature 4.0
Nomenclature Primary Object Term
ReceiptNomenclature Sub-Class
Financial RecordsNomenclature Class
Documentary ObjectsNomenclature Category
Category 08: Communication ObjectsArchive Details
Date(s) of Creation
1719 - 1999