Map of the Public Surveys in California ; to Accompany Report of the Surveyor Genl., 1860

Cartographer: Compiled in the U.S. Surveyor General’s Office, San Francisco (J. W. Mandeville, Surveyor General); lithographed by Julius Bien, New York

Year: 1860

Issued 10 years after statehood, this updated survey map color-codes California’s terrain: salmon tints mark mountain and desert ranges, green washes note timbered valleys, and the familiar rectangular township grid blankets the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. Finished public-land surveys appear as solid section lines; blank expanses in the Sierra, Mojave, and northwest coast reveal areas still unsurveyed in 1860. Outlined ranchos show confirmed Mexican land grants, while a boxed legend lists each private grant by name and acreage for quick reference. Railroads are absent, but wagon roads, military posts, and mining camps thread through the surveyed blocks, underscoring how federal mapping guided settlement and resource claims. Latitude-longitude and township-range ticks let land agents locate any 640-acre section, making this sheet an essential administrative tool for homesteaders, speculators, and county officials during California’s rapid post-Gold-Rush expansion.