Collection: Books and Periodicals > Nevada County Historical Society Bulletins

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Title: Volume 060-2 - April 2006 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: 2014-03-12 08:24:12 OCR Software Version #: tesseract 5.4.1 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 04:06:02 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 04:06:02

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

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ao =~ ~~ ~~ ro Relevant Timeline Jan. 24, 1848: James Marshall discovers gold at Coloma. Nov. 13, 1849: Forty-niners and Mexicans approve a constitution and elect a Governor, Lieutenant Governor, 2 Congressmen, 16 State Senators and 36 Assemblymen Dec. 22, 1849: Senators and Assemblymen meet at San Jose to elect supreme court justices and other state officers. Jan. 18, 1850: Marysville residents elect an alcalde. March 1850: Caldwell’s Upper Store residents elect alcalde. March 11, 1850: Act for incorporation of cities approved. March 27, 1850: Act for incorporation of towns approved. April 1, 1850: Yuba County officers and justices of the peace elected at Marysville, Rough and Ready, Grass Valley, Nevada City and Foster’s Bar. April 17, 1850: 20-30 miners choose name “Nevada” to replace Caldwell’s Store and Deer Creek Dry Diggings. Sept. 9, 1850: California admitted to the Union as a state. Oct. 7, 1850: Voters elect replacements for state and county officers who resigned after April 1850. Nov. 18, 1850: Petition to incorporate City of Nevada is filed with Yuba County Clerk. Dec. 12, 1850: Post office is named “Nevada City” by federal government. Jan. 1851: Assemblyman Stephen Field introduces bill to incorporate City of Nevada. Feb. 7, 1851: Field inroduces bill to create Nevada County. March 13, 1851: Legislature incorporates City of Nevada. April 14, 1851: City of Nevada voters elect mayor and ten aldermen. May 18, 1851: Legislature approves creation of Nevada County. May 26, 1851: Nevada County voters elect county and township officers. Sept. 3, 1851: State voters elect state and township officers Jan. 26, 1852: Assemblyman Ellis introduces bill to repeal City of Nevada charter and provide for payment of debts. Feb. 6, 1852: Nevada City charter repealed by legislature. Jan. 5, 1854: Nevada County Court. of Sessions approves petition to incorporate Town of Nevada. Jan. 21, 1854: Town of Nevada voters elect town officers. April 1856: Act of March 27, 1850, that delegates power to county courts to incorporate towns declared unconsitutional by Supreme Court. Town of Nevada ceases to exist and its ordinances are declared null and void. April 1856: Legislature delegates power to incorporate cities and towns to county boards of supervisors. April 19, 1856: City of Nevada incorporated by legislature. May 5, 1856: City of Nevada voters elect town officers. Feb. 4, 1858: City of Nevada officers ask legislature to repeal city charter. March 26, 1858: Legislature amends City of Nevada charter instead of repealing it. March 12, 1878: City of Nevada City incorporated to conform with new state constitution. NCHS Bulletin April 2006 How Nevada Became a City by David A. Comstock S OMETIME IN THE LATE 1970S HERB CAPLAN SHOWED me the original 1850 petition requesting incorporation for Nevada City. It was one of many Nevada County related items in his Sacramento bookstore; another was the 1867 History of Nevada County by Edwin F. Bean, which he loaned me, hoping . would buy it. I wish that I had, but it seemed too pricey then, as was the petition. Eventually the document wound up in Len Berardi’s store in Nevada City, where it was noticed and purchased by Richard Quebedeaux. Quebedeaux and I had exchanged letters for several years, and in March 1988 he told me he was researching his latest acquisition. I offered him bits and pieces of biographical data pertaining to the signers, and about three months later he sent me his report. What follows is a mix of that and what I know about Nevada City’s first ry at municipal government. On March 11, 1850, six months before Congress bestowed statehood (Nevada City jurist Niles Searls called this a time when “we were a State de jure, but not de facto), the first legislature passed a pair of laws to provide for the incorporation of cities and towns—a city must have at least 2000 inhabitants, while a town could squeeze by with only 200. An existing community (“town or village” was the actual language) could be incorporated by the legislature—or by the county court where the place was situated—if a majority of its residents signed a petition that described the boundaries and dignified it with a name. If the legislature (or the county court) was satisfied that it met the requirements, it had to comply with the request. We no longer have governmental entities that resemble the old county court, but between 1851 and 1855 this body was endowed with a combination of judicial and executive powers—something the U.S. Constitution frowns upon, then and now, but this went unnoticed at the time. Each county court (known also as a “court of sessions”) consisted of three judges, chief of whom was the county judge (elected by county voters). The others were selected when the many justices of the peace of that county (one or more per township—an area comparable to a modern supervisioral district) met and chose two of their number to act as associate justices. County courts not only inquired into criminal cases (by means of a grand jury) and tied all criminal cases except murder, manslaughter and arson, but they also governed the county. When this petition was circulated in the fall of 1850, 219 residents signed it. The petition and a map were filed with the Yuba County Clerk in Marysville on November 18, 1850, by attorney Hiram C. Hodge, for the would-be city was inside the boundaries of Yuba County at that time. Throughout the summer of 1850, two Sacramento newspapers (the Transcript and the Placer Times) and the 5