Volume 1, Issue #2, January, 1969
PIONEER JEWISH SAN FRANCISCO STOCK BROKERS
by Edgar M. Kahn
OUT OF THE GAMBLING ERA OF THE 1870's that financially wrecked San Francisco came a different type of stock broker. A new group of conservative serious-minded security dealers appeared who financed agriculture, gas and light companies, and transportation which would prosper as California's population grew.
These brokers, some of whom were Jewish, invested their clients' as well as their own capital in shares of young well-managed corporations. The security dealers established themselves in basement offices in the business district and were devoted to the tasks of not only making money, but also restoring the confidence of speculators and investors who had lost heavily in Nevada mining ventures when the Comstock boom collapsed.
The story of the Jews who played an important role in the origins of the stock exchange and the beginnings of San Francisco's industrial undertakings, forms a hitherto untold chapter of California's financial history. They came as immigrants to San Francisco from Germany where glowing newspaper reports told of a distant land of unlimited opportunities, untouched natural resources and fortunes to be made by thrifty persons willing to work hard. California was a land where there were no deep-seated traditions restricting an individual's right to work in .a job of his choice.
In Germany Jews were confronted with obstacles to employment by the guilds because of religious differences. The ruling political power denied Jews the full rights of citizenship. Jews were opposed to compulsory military service which denied them the opportunity for advancement because of their faith.
Twelve years after California became a state, in the month of September, 1862, the first mining exchange, the San Francisco Stock Exchange Board was formed. 1 This association was followed in January, 1872, by the California Stock and Exchange Board and on June 7, 1875, by the Pacific Stock Exchange. These organizations dealt only in mining stocks. 2
On September 18, 1882, The Local Security Board was founded to trade in stocks and bonds of corporations other than mining shares. On October 2, the board was renamed The Stock and Fond Exchange out of which grew the present Pacific Coast Stock Exchange by a consolidation of the San Francisco and Los Angeles exchanges. 3
Even the most optimistic member in 1882 could not have foreseen the tremendous growth in the number of shares (140,000) traded for the year ending September, 1883. 4 Nevertheless, the basis was then being laid for the extraordinary expansion which was to follow, for example, the 114,000,000-share volume of 1967.
Although ;here was no need for an exchange during the gold rush era, there was nevertheless a demand for shares of California mines. 5 To meet this need in the late 1850's, men trained in New York brokerage practices agreed on a time to gather in San Francisco's Bank Exchange Saloon, located on the southwest corner of Washington and Montgomery streets where, between drinks, they traded in eastern and local securities. A change took place with the discovery of the Comstock Lode in 1859. The rapid increase of mines prompted their owners to go to San Francisco, where they incorporated and issued stock, and thus provided the groundwork for the speculative era which followed. Brokers, instead of meeting at the saloon, found it more efficient to walk over to another broker's office in order to purchase for an interested client a few feet of a mine or some scrip (money issued by the city of San Francisco).
The brokers' offices were located on Montgomery, California and Pine Streets. Among the fourteen men listed as stock and money dealers in Langley's Directory (1862), two were Jews. 6 They were Louis Sloss and Charles Sutro. The life of Sloss has been written by others and only a brief mention of him will serve the purpose of this article.
Sloss was born on July 13, 1.823, in Untereisenheim, Bavaria; but he spent the greater part of his busy life in California. He was the youngest of five children, two brothers and three sisters. At seventeen he came across the plains to California, and in 1849 he settled in Sacramento. In partnership with Simon Greenewald and Lewis Gerstle, he established in 1857 the mercantile firm of Louis Sloss and Company. The flood of 1862 in Sacramento destroyed their store, and Sloss moved to San Francico to 'embark on new business ventures. He became a mining broker and was elected a member of the San Francisco Stock and Exchange Board in 1866. He resigned in 1873. In 1868 the Alaska Commercial Company was organized and its presidency occupied his time and energy. Louis Sloss is remembered as humble and modest; a foremost San Franciscan and a generous humanitarian. He died at his home in San Rafael on June 4, 1902. 7 With his passing the community lost one of its outstanding Jews. He is buried iii Home of Peace Cemetery in San Mateo County. 8
Gustave Sutro
Photo courtesy of Edgar M. Kahn
Charles and Gustav Sutro were also mining brokers who became prominent San Franciscans. On January 27, 1829, Charles was born in the German village of Aix La Chappelle. The westward march of events and the glamorous tales that came back home from the new world prompted Charles and his brother Gustav to go to New York and then to western Canada. In Vancouver, British Columbia, they became tobacconists. In 1852 the romantic call of California brought them to San Francisco where Charles found employment in a mercantile establishment. His interests, however, were in another direction. He longed for a banking experience similar to the business of his father in the old country. In 1858, with his brothers, Albert, Emil and Gustav, he formed Sutro and Company to engage in general banking. They also did a lucrative business in exchanging coin for gold dust, which they shipped by Wells Fargo Express and sold to eastern money brokers. By hard teamwork the Sutro brothers built a profitable business which won the respect of clients and the banking fraternity.
Charles Sutro was known for his high ideals and business ethics. He was retiring and would pass off a noble deed, a charitable act or a word of praise with the wave of his hand. 9 On April 2, 1931, Sutro was buried at Home of Peace Cemetery. 10
Gustav Sutro, born on October 19, 1828, was described by his friends as a man of determination, vision, and unlimited energy. He was later active in the transportation and electric power development of the rapidly growing city. He served as president of the Omnibus Railroad Company, a horse-drawn concern which ran from South Park to North Beach. In 1884, Gustav Sutro was one of the promoters of the Telegraph Hill Railroad, an early cable line that operated two vehicles. He also served as president of the California Electric Light Company, later absorbed into the Pacific Gas and Electric system. Sutro assisted in the formation of the Safety Nitro Powder Company which supplied explosives to the mines of California and Nevada. Active also in real estate, Gustav Sutro with other investors purchased twenty-five blocks in the Richmond district, an area of barren wind-swept sand dunes. He also was a stockbroker in Real Estate Associates which was organized in 1866 to develop and sell. San Francisco land.
Sutro is credited with saying that if you buy securities of well-managed California enterprises, operating in vital necessary industries, no matter what price you may have paid, be patient; you will see the shares sell much higher than the price at which they were originally purchased. Gustav Sutro died on March 12, 1897. 11
In the early 1860's when the Sutro brothers were active in business, the path of riches led from the barren Nevada Territory hills where miners in Gold Hill, Silver City and Virginia City were discovering rich ore deposits. Prosperity in San Francisco became more and more dependent upon the finding of silver in those remote mining communities. Nevertheless, fortunes were being made and lost because of deception and fraud that accompanied the growing tendency to speculate. Practically every person, regardless of position, profession or wealth took part in the speculative mania that raged like an epidemic. 12
Ten years later, the directory of 1873 estimated the city's population at 188,000 and listed 250 mining, money and stock brokers. 13 Among the more important names mentioned were Isaac and Simon W. Glazier with offices at 426 Montgomery Street. In 1910 Joseph L. King wrote the HISTORY OF THE SAN FRANCISCO STOCK AND EXCHANGE BOARD. He tells of the incidents and facts from memory, since the fire of 1906 destroyed the Board's records. He mentions Isaac and Simon Glazier as partners in "the leading firm" who "had an immense business with many of San Francisco's wealthiest men on their ledger." 14
The few important facts which are available to the writer are that Simon William Glazier, born in 1830 in Bohemia, came to the United States in 1849 and arrived in California in 1852. Isaac and Simon settled in Marysville, established a mercantile business and sold large quantities of tobacco products to the mining communities of the Mother Lode. In 1862 the Glazier brothers moved to San Francisco. They formed a partnership with William Seligsberg, the firm being named Glazier and Seligsberg. On December 24, 1874, Isaac bought Seligsberg's seat on The San Francisco Stock Exchange Board and the firm's name was changed to I. Glazier and Company, with its office located at 426 Montgomery Street. Simon retired in 1881 and moved to New York City. He died on August 30, 1906, and is interred in Salem Field Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.
Isaac Glazier resigned from the Exchange Board in July, 1903, and joined his brother in New York. He died on June 6, 1906, and is buried in Frankfort (Main), Germany. 15
In 1874, over 50,000 persons came to California, at that time the largest western movement since 1852. The east was in a severe depression; however, prosperity lingered in the west supported by the products of the mines and agriculture which commanded high prices. San Francisco was becoming a major community of the United States. 16
But this prosperity ran its course, culminating with the collapse in 1875 of the Comstock boom. The drop in mining stocks was accompanied by a reduction in wages, interest rates and values which had been based upon fictitious and inflated prices of mining shares. Speculators in Europe and the east dumped their shares on the San Francisco exchanges, and buyers withdrew their bids when confronted by the flood of offerings. Money became tight as owners of San Francisco real estate had mortgaged their property to obtain funds with which to protect their mining shares purchased on margin. When the prices of these shares failed to recover, their owners lost both real estate and stock. Business came to a standstill. During 1878 there were 532 failures among the state's 17,000 businesses. Liabilities were in excess of $11,600,000. The next year the number of failures rose to 772. Prosperity did not return until the early 1880's. 17
Lessons were learned from the depression. Stock gambling came to an end, inflation was checked, business was purged of many shady practices, a diversified manufacturing basis was established, and prudent habits were forced upon the people. The period brought to a close, for the time being, schemes designed to exploit miners as well as to cheat investors through stock rigging and fraudulent statements by engineers and superintendents regarding silver deposits. It was common practice for unscrupulous boards of directors to levy assessments and declare dividends irrespective of the need of an assessment or the justification of a disbursement. By these methods, the mining industry came into disrepute. From the mistakes revealed by the depression, a sound basis was laid for the revival of 1881-1882, which ushered in a new prosperous era of industrial and agricultural growth. The speculative 1870's, characterized by economic dislocation and political turmoil, were followed by the more sober and solid 1880'x.
The prosperity of the early 1880's emphasized the need for a stock exchange run on conservative lines to finance the enterprises required to meet the demands of a growing population. Hardrock miners became farmers, planting grain and discovering that a different kind of gold could be harvested from the rich soil of the interior valleys. Little capital was required to purchase land, to work the soil and to store the hay to be used later as supplementary feed for livestock.
New types of landowners like Simon Newman built an empire starting in 1869 with a pioneer merchandise store at Hill's Ferry on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley in Stanislaus County. "The scope of the business," according to Julius Wangenheim, was "divided into two types: the store . . . and the outside interests —lands, cattle, horses, warehouses and loans . . . " 18 The business was incorporated in 1889, and the owners built an empire. The Simon Newman Company continues to operate today.
The development of agriculture, food processing, and manufacturing was accompanied by problems of insufficient capital to support large operations. There was also great demand for capital to finance telephone and telegraph improvements and artificial gas for illuminating streets, factories, stores and homes.
In the 1880's, San Francisco's banks, insurance companies and brokers maintained their quarters in the vicinity of Bush, Montgomery, California, and Sansome streets. Harry Berk, Daniel Meyer, Matthias Meyer, August Helbing, Isaac Strassburger, and Charles and Gustav Sutro were earning a living as stockbrokers. They had received their training under such fearless speculators as James R. Keene, William Ralston, and William Sharon. The brokers still did their business by haphazard and antiquated methods. Their offices consisted of a chair and a desk located in what was often nothing more than a hole in the wall. Transactions took place on a street corner, in a bar, club, or any place where the broker and his customer could meet and agree on a price.
The change in the economy resulted in a new type of stockbroker who refrained from dealing in mining securities and who assisted in financing only well-managed enterprises likely to prosper with the growth of the state. By 1882, numerous investors were looking to industry to put their surplus funds to work. There were at least twenty-five responsible brokers engaged in legitimate investments in conservatively financed companies. They recognized the need for establishing an exchange, fashioned after the New York Stock Exchange, where a fair market could be maintained without the activities of professional stock gamblers who could cause fluctuations of several millions of dollars in a single day.
John Perry, Jr., in the early 1880's, took the lead in organizing The Local Security Board which was to be an unincorporated association of brokers united for buying and selling stocks and bonds. The men who were invited to form the board were respected., conservative, experienced brokers who could help restore the confidence of investors who had suffered losses in mining ventures during the collapse of the Comstock boom.
The first meeting of The Local Security Board was held without the excitement which had characterized the earlier mining exchanges. Twenty-five dealers were sent the following invitation:
San Francisco, Sept. 15, 1882
You are requested to attend a meeting of the Brokers in Local Securities on Monday, the 18th Inst. at 9 o'clock a.m. at the office of Wohl and Pollitz, 403 California Street, for the purpose of taking steps to organize a Local Security Board.
Nineteen of the twenty-five attended the first meeting. Among the Jewish charter members were: Harry Berl, Samuel J. Frank, Marcus H. Grossmayer, August Helbing, Matthias Meyer, Edward Pollitz, Isaac Strassburger, Charles Sutro and Gustav Sutro
At this initial meeting the following officers were chosen to serve for the first year: John Perry, Jr., president; August Helbing, vice-president; Andrew Baird, secretary; Edward Pollitz, assistant secretary; and Daniel Meyer, treasurer. 19
Isaac Strassburger, the last surviving member of the original organizers of the San Francisco Stock Exchange, in 1937, when he was eighty, related to the writer his recollections of the early days of the exchange.
I remember John Perry, Jr. He always wore a silk hat, an old-fashioned high collar, well-opened in the front, and a black scarf around his neck and throat. That was the prevailing style of the '70's and '80's of gentlemen of finance.
We paid fifty dollars, signed an agreement, congratulated ourselves, and we had an exchange. That was all there was to it. The first headquarters of the exchange was the office of Andrew Baird at 312 California Street. The London and San Francisco Bank which merged with The Bank of California was on the ground floor. Baird was a well-known capitalist, a successful stock broker, and the first secretary of the exchange.
When we started trading there were so few transactions that we put the names of the officers, members and employees on the list of stocks traded for the day, in order to fill the sheet which was sent to banks, members and newspapers. Before we organized there were wide discrepancies in prices. For example, one broker would offer Fireman's Fund Insurance stock and there would be fluctuations of two, three and four points between sales. Brokers occasionally failed to fulfill their obligations. After we started the exchange, we gave our word to deal fairly, to maintain prices, to conduct ourselves on a high level of business ethics. We would resist all attempts of the state legislature to police our operations. We progressed slowly because we did not take in every Tom, Dick and Harry. Business became dull and we had nine or ten unsold seats on our hands.
We listed the stock in much the same way as the listing committee does today (193?) . If the investigating committee said there was anything wrong with the company, we did not accept the stock, in spite of our desire to increase public participation and activity on the exchange.
We drew up a constitution containing rigid standards and obeyed these requirements to the letter. Fines were common; expulsions were rare. Although money was plentiful, the public was not educated to buy stocks and bonds.. Merchants and manufacturers were our potential customers. The stock business was so dull that we did not have enough to do, so some of the stock dealers became real estate brokers.
The exchange enabled the investor to put his cash into stocks or bonds and readily to convert the securities back into cash at market prices. The investor was protected by rigidly enforced rules which assured him that his order would be executed at open and competitive prices. 20
Isaac Strassburger lived to be over ninety. Even at that venerable age he kept an active interest in his business affairs. Born in Bavaria in 1857, he left to avoid compulsory military service. Under cover of darkness., friends rowed him to the S. S. Oceanic, lying at anchor in the Hamburg Harbor. He climbed aboard, shared a cabin with six passengers and arrived in New York City twenty-two days later. Two months after leaving Germany, the fifteen-year old boy sailed in through the Golden Gate on the S. S. Sacramento. He found employment in a mercantile house.
In 1880 Strassburger opened his office on Montgomery Street between Pine and California Streets to deal in securities. Because he was dependable and enjoyed the confidence of other brokers, he was invited to be a member of The Local Security Board. In 1906, when fire swept the business section, his home at 2112 Jackson Street was made available to the members as a meeting place to discuss their organizational plans. The year following the disaster, he was elected president of the exchange. 21
August Helbing, who was elected the first vice-president of the exchange, was born on January 13, 1824, in Munich, Germany. After his graduation from a Munich industrial school he was employed in a mercantile firm where he learned the business principles which he applied in later years with successful results. Glowing reports concerning gold discoveries in California influenced Helbing and his friends, Moritz Meyer and August Wasserman, to depart from Germany for California by way of New York, New Orleans and the Isthmus of Panama.
An unusual incident occurred on the final leg of his journey which reveals one of Helbing's character traits. He paid $450.00 for his passage from Panama City, but the steamship company sold duplicate tickets for some of the space. Helbing defended his right to his cabin at revolver point. But the next day, when he learned of a woman and her child with no shelter other than the open deck, he gallantly yielded his stateroom to them for the remainder of the voyage and he remained topside for twenty-one days, the time required to reach San Francisco.
Shortly after he was settled in San Francisco in October, 1850, Helbing and twelve coreligionists organized the Eureka Benevolent Society. A room was rented on Kearny Street where sick and destitute Jewish immigrants could be helped. The poor and homeless were given board and lodging in his rooms and in the dwellings of his friends. The association also gave financial help to widows, orphans and found fobs for unemployed Jews. These compassionate deeds by Helbing exemplified the highest form of piety and humanitarian motives. He inspired other Jews through great generosity, strong religious convictions and intense patriotism. He was one of the organizers of the Pacific Hebrew Orphanage Association. He served as president of the People's Institute which preceded the Mechanics' Institute and Mercantile Library. He left his impress on the minds of his friends through his interest in public schools, civic affairs and philanthropic work.
Helbing founded the dry goods firm of Meyer, Helbing and Company. Subsequently, he became a partner in the wholesale crockery business of Helbing, Strauss and Company. Helbing next became a stock broker and a partner with Jacob Greenebaum in Greenebaum, Helbing and Company. He retired after a dew years, complaining that the business methods of some mine superintendents and boards of directors who manipulated the value of mining securities were in conflict with his code of business ethics.
August Helbing was a man of few words and his holographic will of a few lines reveals that fact. He left everything to wife, Francesca, who died before h,e did. He passed away on August 17, 1896, at the age of seventy-two. 22 Rabbi Jacob Voorsanger of Temple Emanu-El officiated at the funeral held in San Francisco. He is buried at Home of Peace Cemetery. 23
Harry Berl, another charter member of the exchange, was born on April 1, 1948, in Philadelphia. About 1860, accompanied by his mother, sister and brother, he came to California and settled in San Rafael. He was given his first employment by his uncle, Harry Baer, who operated a general merchandise store in that town.
A few years later Berl came to San Francisco and became a foreign and domestic exchange broker. This activity served as a stepping -stone to a stock brokerage business at rented desk space at 401 California Street. By diligent application, he built up a clientele of satisfied customers.
Berl was a retiring individual, but always managed to make his presence felt in any gathering. There is a story told about him which illustrated his modesty. A prominen banker gave a dinner at which Harry Berl was the honored guest. He did not even tell his wife of the recognition bestowed upon him. Some months later, the host of the dinner mentioned the event to her. Mrs. Berl is said to have complained that her husband frequently carried the secrets and ethics of a broker a little too far. Berl remained active in business until his death on January 25, 1921.. 24 He is buried at Home of Peace Cemetery. 25
Were it not for the Glazier brothers, the firm of J. Barth and Company, in all probability, would not be in business today. In 18b8, Isaac and Simon Glazier were responsible for bringing their niece, Katy Barth, to San Francisco. Philip, and later Jacob, Barth were sent funds to join their relatives.
Philip was born in 1852 in Louchon, Bohemia. Young Barth received his training from his uncles, the Glazier brothers. After the collapse of the Comstock mining boom, around 1877, the Glaziers believed New York offered greater opportunities for stock brokers. They turned their San Francisco business over to Philip Barth who became one of the first new members of the Stock and Bond Exchange on January 17, 1883. He was the first to pay $500.00 for a seat. Philip established his office at 440 California Street and with the passing of time he became a prominent stock broker. He passed away on November 25, 1897. Jacob continued the business and became an exchange member on October 9, 1896. Both brothers were bachelors. Their business success can be attributed to unquestioned honesty in their dealings with clients. Jacob's death occurred on March 3, 1913. His remains are interred in the Barth plot at Dome of Peace Cemetery. 26
The prominent pioneer broker, Edward Pollitz, merits passing mention. Pollitz migrated to California at an early age from Frankfort (Main) . After an unsuccessful experience as a dry goods merchant in Visalia, he went to San Francisco.
In 1882 he was one of the struggling brokers who became a charter member of the exchange. From Wohl and Pollitz, located in the basement of 403 California Street, the old Fireman's Fund Insurance Building, went the invitations to organize an exchange. Pollitz was made assistant secretary and had the distinction of serving as the second president in 1898, an office he held for four years.
Pollitz increased the number of his customers because of his integrity, perseverance and winning smile. He foresaw the opportunities for growth and profit in those Hawaiian sugar companies which enjoyed competent management. His firm was partly responsible for trading in the Hawaiian Commercial Sugar Company, which later was acquired by Alexander and Baldwin, Inc.
Edward Pollitz was a bachelor who was remembered for his sense of humor and kindly nature. He died on September 11, 1912, and was buried in the Cypress Lawn Memorial Park in San Mateo County. 27
Daniel Meyer served as the first treasurer of the exchange. He also deserves attention because of the prominent place and benevolent influence he left on the community where he lived and worked for more than sixty years. His birth occured on February 29, 1824, in the remote village of Salzburg, Bavaria. His early training was in banking in his native land. In 1842 he came to New York. In June, 1850, he arrived in San Francisco coming by way of the Isthmus of Panama. Daniel and his brother Jonas engaged in the tobacco business. In 1857 Daniel established the Bank of Daniel Meyer, located on Pine between Sansome and Battery Streets, which became well known as a financially sound institution. He served as vice-president of the German Savings and Loan Society. He also found time to acquire the knowledge to make him a man of culture. 28 His business career was an honorable one, and his exemplary habits of integrity made him the perfect choice to become the treasurer of the exchange. 29
Daniel Meyer gave to causes of various faiths. He was one of the large contributors to the Federation of Jewish Charities. His death on September 5, 1911, was mourned by San Franciscans in all walks of life.
Matthias Meyer, a brother of Daniel and Jonas, one of fourteen children, was born on January 17, 1829, near Furth, Bavaria. Upon completion of his education, he found a position in a large Paris bank. He specialized in foreign exchange, which set the direction he intended to follow in his. business career.
Matthias went west, engaged in the dry goods business at Sonora, California, but San Francisco offered greater opportunities to an ambitious youth. In 1860 he arrived in what was to be the financial metropolis of the west and became a partner with Jonas in the tobacco business. At the outset of the Civil War, the federal government placed an embargo on trade with the Confederacy. Matthias and Jonas fortunately, had a large tobacco inventory and with an increase in demand made a substantial profit on the sale of tobacco. 30
In 1870 Matthias became associated with the Bank of Daniel Meyer. By 1882 he was recognized as a leading stock broker. He was with Perry, Strassburger and Berl in front of the office of Wohl and Pollitz when the suggestion was made to rent a meeting place where they could transact business, rather than walking around looking for buyers and sellers of stock.
Matthias Meyer represented the Bank of Daniel Meyer on the exchange until he died at 'seventy-nine on July 16, 1908.31
These Jewish brokers were among the founders of the exchange. From their brief biographies one can realize that they were outstanding men. They were dedicated to the rules which protected their clients from fraud and misrepresentation. In committee work they carried on a relentless crusade against the purveyors of worthless securities. They developed markets which provided the medium through which capital was raised to meet the financial needs of California's struggling corporations. In view of the restrictions of their activities in the old world, the brokers were strong advocates of free enterprise, while they regulated their actions by heavy fines against irregularities and any infraction of the exchange's rules. Their informal, closely-knit association may have made slow progress, but the members did finance banks, insurance, sugar, water, gas and transportation companies out of which grew today's giant corporations. The position of the Pacific Coast Stock Exchange can be attributed in part to the men who laid the solid foundations of The Stock and Bond Exchange.
JACOB BARTH
Courtesy of Edgar M. Kahn
Endnotes
1. Joseph L. King, HISTORY of THE SAN FRANCISCO STOCK AND EXCHANGE BOARD (San Francisco, 1910), pp. 1-9.
2. Benjamin E. Lloyd, LIGHTS AND SHADES IN SAN FRANCISCO (San Francisco, 1876), pp. 35-36.
3. Minutes of The Stock and Bond Exchange (At the Pacific Coast Stock Exchange offices, San Francisco), ms., Vol. I, 1882.
4. First Annual Report, The Stock and Bond Exchange, Year ending September 18, 1883 (At Exchange offices, San Francisco).
5. Hubert H. Bancroft, HISTORY OF CALIFORNIA (San Francisco, 1890), Vol. VII, pp. 666-671.
6. Henry G. Langley, THE SAN FRANCISCO DIRECTORY (San Francisco, 1862).
7. Martin A. Meyer, WESTERN JEWRY, (San Francisco, 1916) pp. 147-148.
8. Home of Peace Cemetery records (Congregation Emanu-El, San Francisco).
9. Interviews regarding Charles and Gustav with Mrs. Olga Sutro Manson, daughter of Gustave Sutro, and with Sidney L. Schwartz, retired senior partner of Sutro and Co.
10. Home of Peace Cemetery records, op. cit.
11. Obituary of Gustav Sutro, San Francisco Call, March 12, 1897, p. 9, c. 6.
12. John S. Hittell, "A HISTORY OF THE CITY OF SAN FRANCISCO (San Francisco, 1878), pp. 428-429.
13. Langley, The San Francisco Directory of 1873, p. 686.
14. King, op. cit., pp. 158-159.
15. Correspondence with Henry S. Glazier of New York City, regarding his grandfather, Simon, and his great-uncle, Isaac Glazier.
16. Hittell, op. cit., pp. 399-400.
17. Ira B. Cross, "Financing and Empire," HISTORY OF BANKING IN CALIFORNIA (San Francisco, 1927) Vol. 1, p. 371.
18. Julius Wangenheim, "An Autobiography," California Historical Society Quarterly, Vol, XXXV (September 1956) p. 267.
19. Minutes of The Stock and Bond Exchange, op. cit.
20. Interview with Isaac Strassburger, San Francisco, May 10, 1937.
21. Interview with Mrs. Newton H. Neustadter, daughter of Isaac Strassburger.
22. Interview with Mrs. Robert Rothschild, daughter of August Helbing.
23. August Helbing's obituary, San Francisco Call, August 20, 1896.
24. Interview with Edwin D. Berl concerning his father, Harry Berl.
25. Harry Berl's obituary, San Francisco Chronicle, January 25, 1921, p. 10, col. 8.
26. Family records of the author, grand-nephew of Jacob and Philip Barth.
27. Interview with Isaac Strassburger concerning Edward Pollitz.
28. Meyer, op. cit., p. 127.
29. Interview with Alfred Meyer, who is a grand-nephew of Daniel Meyer.
30. Ibid.
31. Home of Peace Cemetery records, op. cit.
A Western Jewish Anecdote
A SAN DIEGO FIRST
Jewish Fast. — The Israelites of San Diego, faithful to the religion of their forefathers, observed their New Year's days and day of Atonement, with due solemnity. The day of Atonement, one of the most solemn and sacred days in the Jewish calendar, was observed by Messrs. Lewis Franklin, Jacob Marks, and Chas. A. Fletcher, (the only three Hebrews in town) by their assembling in the house of the former gentleman, and passing the entire day in fasting and prayers. We are glad to record such an act of religious faith under circumstances the most unfavorable. — From the San Diego Herald, October 9, 1851, Vol. 1, No. 20, p. 2, c. 2.
