Monika Trobits Livres

San Francisco was booming in the mid-nineteenth century, and along with adventurers seeking their fortunes came sacks of green coffee beans. The old Yerba Buena Cove swiftly filled with ships, and the city emerged as the third-largest coffee port in the United States. What followed was the rise--and local demise--of the "big three" coffee roasters: Folger's, Hills Brothers and MJB. Specialized Bay Area roasters like Peerless, Peet's and Blue Bottle sprang up in their wake, while places such as Tosca's, Caff Trieste and the Blue Unicorn blazed the way for modern coffeehouses. Join author Monika Trobits as she traces the historic voyage of the humble coffee bean to the shores of San Francisco Bay.

Spurred by the promise of gold, hungry adventurers flocked to San Francisco in search of opportunity on the eve of the Civil War. The city flourished and became a magnet for theater. Some of the first buildings constructed in San Francisco were theater houses, and John Wilkes Booth's famous acting family often graced the city's stages. In just two years, San Francisco's population skyrocketed from eight hundred to thirty thousand, making it an instant city" where tensions between transplanted Northerners and Southerners built as war threatened the nation. Though seemingly isolated, San Franciscans took their part in the conflict. Some extended the Underground Railroad to their city, while others joined the Confederate-aiding Knights of the Golden Circle. Including a directory of local historic sites and streets, author Monika Trobits chronicles the dramatic and volatile antebellum and Civil War history of the City by the Bay."