Archaeologists at work at the site of San Francisco’s $4 billion Transbay Transit Center have excavated 70 artifacts from the area once known as Yerba Buena Cove. These artifacts, which date to the Gold Rush era, shed light on the day-to-day lives of Chinese and Irish immigrant workers and are currently exhibited in the lobby of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority building.
Gold Rush Artifacts, Gold Rush Lives
When people began to flock to California after the discovery of gold in the late 1840s, many of them entered the city through Yerba Buena Cove, which was a major Gold Rush port. There was no place for the immigrants to stay—as late as 1848, the population of the city was reported as being slightly over 800—many of them camped in the dunes behind Yerba Buena Cove. Archaeologists have found evidence of their camps that include boots, bottles, barrels, and privies.
A Working Class Neighborhood
By the 1880s, Yerba Buena Cove had been filled in and converted into a working-class neighborhood of clapboard houses that included the area between First and Beale streets on Minna, Natoma, and Mission. The inhabitants were Chinese, Irish, Swedish, German, and Italian immigrants who worked at the San Francisco Gas and Light Co, the Selby Smelting Works, Risdon Iron Works, and Miner’s Foundry, among others. Workers from this neighborhood also worked on the construction of San Fransisco's bridges and roadways.
Working Class Artifacts
The artifacts uncovered during the excavations include artifacts that seem both exotic and quaint to modern eyes. Animal bone toothbrushes, ceramic chamber pots, apothecary jars, and the heads of porcelain dolls hint at the domestic lives of ordinary citizens. French perfume bottles, clay opium pipes, and ceramic tea pots from China were also recovered. An iron chisel and metal pulley used by a stone mason were rusty but recognizable.
Taken as a whole, the artifacts show how much the South of Market neighborhood has changed from its humble beginnings and hint at a past the most of us would find unrecognizable. Stay tuned to find out more about finds as the construction at the new Transbay Terminal Center proceeds.
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