Collection: Books and Periodicals > Nevada County Historical Society Bulletins

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Title: Volume 042-4 - October 1988 Collection Type: Books and Periodicals Collection Name: Nevada County Historical Society Bulletins # of Pages: 8 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2014-02-19 07:38:16 OCR Software Version #: tesseract 5.4.1 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 04:05:58 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 04:05:58

Original Held At: Searls Historical Library Location: 161 Nevada City Hwy, Nevada City, CA 95959

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California silk.” On June 2, the Transcript stated that Muller had “several thousand silk worms feeding,” and that he had been engaged in crossing the Chinese and Japanese varieties. Muller had put out 100,000 eggs for hatching, and ‘‘will be able to demonstrate... what can be done in the culture of silk in this locality.’ Both his and Isoard’s experiments “have been exceedingly successful, and the cocoons produced by them are larger by a third than any others raised in the State. They had no loss from disease,” the newspaper commented, “and can count almost to a certainty upon every egg producing a cocoon.” In the same issue, Muller declared he had written to Herr Schnell, inviting him “‘to see what Nevada County can do in the business.”’ (Schnell was the German silk expert alluded to earlier in this study.) Muller's experiments were described in detail in the Transcript’s of June 4. Muller had “‘five or six thousand worms,” and was experimenting with the native California worm which he had crossed with the Chinese and Japanese. “The progress made by Mr. Muller demonstrates that Nevada County is eminently fitted for the business by soil and climate,” the newspaper stated, and quoting the Grass Valley Union, called for “‘an association which would set out a plantation of trees, and devote itself to rearing the worms, reeling, spinning and weaving the silk.” Such an undertaking was underlined in the June 5, issue of the Transcript. The previous evening, at a meeting held in Grass Valley, Edmund G. Waite and Charles Beaver were appointed to form a committee to consult with Herr Schnell and induce him to come here before locating his Japanese colony. (Waite, former editor of the Nevada Journal and of the Transcript, had represented Nevada County as an Assemblyman in 1855, and as State Senator in 1856 and 1857. He was later involved in the growing of grape vines when he planted 1,000 vines. Beaver was ‘‘conversant with the silk industry in France.’’) “Whatever may be the result of this conference with Herr Schnell,” the Transcript noted, even if the German expert didn’t come here, “let a joint stock company be established... and around every miner’s cabin the mulberry will be planted, and the wives and children of the people will find the culture of silk an amusing passtime.” Upon arriving in San Francisco, Schnell met with several parties, eager “to call upon this German Hercules,” as the Transcript dubbed him on June 10. Schnell and Bennetts, agents for the Japanese silk culturists, opted to purchase a ranch near Gold Hill in El Dorado County, where “they express themselves highly pleased with the location for silk and tea culture.” The newspaper stated that “‘It is perfectly useless to expect that outside capital will aid Nevada County unless the people show their confidence in the prospect,” and again called for a stock company to be organized. Consequently, on June 10, a group of local businessmen (including Waite) formed the Nevada Sericultural and Vinicultural Association for the purpose of encouraging the silk industry and the culture of the grape. “The project is important, not so much as an experiment, for we do not so consider it,’ the Transcript noted on June 12, ‘but from the fact that by engaging in the business on a larger scale than heretofore, inducements will be offered for capital to take hold, and in a short time trees enough will be raised to warrant the building of a manufactory.” The newspaper further stated, “The prospects of Nevada County is certainly good for the future, and to insure it, people have only [to] take advantage of the resources within their reach.” On July 13, the Transcript quoted the Alta, which reported that Schnell and “his Japanese are in fine spirits. The rapidity of the growth ™ Ed Muller, musician and teacher. This picture was taken when he was 81 years old. 33