A Birds-Eye View of Sacramento, “The City of the Plain”

Cartographer: Grafton Tyler Brown — drawn, designed, and published by G. T. Brown & Co. Lithographers, Sacramento, 1870

Year: 1857

This sweeping lithograph looks northwest across the Sacramento River, capturing the capital’s rectilinear street grid, levee-lined waterfront, and busy steamboat landings just after the transcontinental railroad reached the city. Smoke plumes from locomotives and river packets hint at Sacramento’s role as a freight hub linking the Southern Pacific rails with river commerce to San Francisco. Orchards and irrigated fields fringe the town, emphasizing its agricultural hinterland, while long plank walks and tree-shaded avenues march toward the distant Yolo plain. A decorative border frames twenty-five inset vignettes of landmark buildings—from the State Capitol under construction to hotels, banks, foundries, and the iconic City Market—serving both as civic pride and as a commercial directory. Fine stipple shading renders surrounding sloughs and swales that the city’s levees were engineered to tame after the disastrous floods of the 1860s. For researchers, Brown’s print offers a richly detailed snapshot of Sacramento’s urban form, riverfront infrastructure, and leading businesses at the dawn of its railroad era.