Wells Fargo Mining Company - Virginia District, Story County, Nevada 1879

Beautiful SCARCE and highly desired certificate from the Wells Fargo Mining Company issued in 1879. This historic document was printed by the G.T. Brown & Co. S.F and has an ornate border around it with a vignette of an old Wells Fargo Stagecoach pulled by four horses. This vignette features a image similar to the stagecoach that is a signature piece for Wells Fargo Bank today. The vignette was designed by African-American artist Grafton Tyler Brown. This certificate has the signatures of the Company’s President and Secretary, and is over 130 years old. The company was incorporated in California on January 28, 1875.

The certificate was issued to it is issued to M. Morgenstern for 50 shares. A similar piece sold in an R.M. Smythe auction for $5040 in 2000.


Certificate Vignette



United States annual mining review and stock ledger reported the following in 1879:

WELLS FARGO MINING COMPANY.

VIRGINIA, STOREY COUNTY, NEVADA.

Office 309 California Street. D. M. Beaton, president; W. M. Hcllman, secretary; D. M. Seoton, A. J. Adams, Oeo W. Dixon, Geo. MeConnell, Oeo. R. Pcrrin, trustees. Annual meeting, last Thursday in January. So. "f shares 103,000. No. of feet, 1,500. No. ot assessment, 11. Amount, 50c. per share. Levied, September 11. 1878 ' Total assessments, $226,800. Listed on San Francisco Stock and Exchange Board, Pacific Stock Exchange, and California Stock Exchange Board.

This is one of the oldest locations in the mining section known as North Virginia. It is situated a little less than a mile in a direct line to the eastward from the original locations on the Comstock. Formations similar to those on the Comstock are plainly traced across the dividing canon, and are found in North Virginia. The situation of the Wells Fargo is directly east of the Utah, Sierra Nevada, eta. A shaft has been sunk that cuts through a large ledge of promising vein matter, from which liberal assays have been made. Hoisting works have been erected, with machinery sufficient to conduct operations 1,200 feet down, at least.

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Born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Grafton Tyler Brown was an illustrator, landscape and frontier subject painter, and lithographer, who became California's first black sketch artist. He worked first for the lithography firm of Kuchel and Dresel Company, whose specialty was views of California mining towns and mining genre.

His family were freed slaves who moved from Maryland in 1837 and arrived in San Francisco from Pennsylvania in the early 1860s.

Grafton Tyler Brown was the first African-American artist in the American West. He worked as a lithographer at Kuchel and Dresel in San Francisco, where he specialized in "bird's-eye" city views. He bought the business in 1867, renaming it G.T. Brown & Co. In 1872, he sold the business to devote his full time to travel and oil painting, settling and opening a studio in Portland from 1886-1889.

Grafton Tyler Brown's western paintings are primarily of physical features such as mountains, waterfalls, etc. Some will have small figures, usually local Indians.

Grafton Tyler Brown was a cartographer, lithographer, and painter, widely considered the first professional African American artist in California. Born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1841, Brown learned lithography in Philadelphia and then became part of a cohort of African Americans who sought better economic and social opportunities in the West during the 1850s.

Brown's maps, prints, and paintings are housed in archives in Victoria, British Columbia, San Francisco, California, and Tacoma, Washington. Major exhibitions of his work in Los Angeles, Oakland, and Tacoma demonstrate Brown's significant contribution to the settlement of the West as well as reflecting the beauty and diversity of the Pacific Northwest.