Carmen Gillett, age 12, of Sarasota, Florida, for her question:

Who started the California Gold Rush?

Nobody started this feverish rush on purpose. But whenever somebody finds free gold lying around, the word spreads like wildfire. People crowd in from far and wide., all hoping to find their share and get rich quick the easy way. The event that triggered the California gold rush occurred on January 24, 1848. John Marshall had built a runaway to carry the water from John Sutter's mill, near Sacramento. On that day he chanced to see some shiny yellow pebbles in the running water. He tested them in a steamy, soapy laundry tub. They did not tarnish    so they were real gold and not iron pyrite, or fool's gold.

Somehow the news was whispered around and soon spread throughout the world. Neither John Marshall nor John Sutter had a chance to take their rightful share from the gold¬ rich territory. Hopeful prospectors claimed and won squatter's rights and within a year the frantic gold rush to California was in full swing.