California Dream

The California Dream is the

psychological motivation to gain fast
wealth or fame in a new land. Some
argue that, as a result of the California
Gold Rush after 1849, California's name
became indelibly connected with the
Gold Rush, and fast success in a new
world became known as the "California
Dream",[1] while others claim this concept
did not emerge until the 1960s.[2]
California was perceived as a place of
new beginnings, where great wealth could
reward hard work and good luck. The
notion inspired the idea of an American
Dream. California was seen as a lucky
place, a land of opportunity and good
fortune. It was a powerful belief,
underlying many of the accomplishments
of the state, and equally potent when
threatened.[3]

Sailing to California at the beginning of the Gold Rush

Historian H. W. Brands noted that in the

years after the Gold Rush, the California
Dream spread across the nation:
The old American Dream . . .
was the dream of the
Puritans, of Benjamin
Franklin's "Poor Richard" . . .
of men and women content
to accumulate their modest
fortunes a little at a time,
year by year by year. The
new dream was the dream of
instant wealth, won in a
twinkling by audacity and
good luck. [This] golden
dream . . . became a
prominent part of the
 American psyche only after
Sutter's Mill.[4]
Overnight, California gained the
international reputation as the "golden
state"—with gold and lawlessness the
main themes.[5]

Migrants
Generations of immigrants have been
attracted by the California Dream.
California farmers,[6] oil drillers,[7] movie
makers,[8] aerospace corporations [9] and
"dot-com" entrepreneurs have each had
their boom times in the decades after the
Gold Rush.
Part of the "California Dream" was "that
every family could have its own private
home."[10][11]

As historian Kevin Starr has pointed out,

for many if not most migrants to the
golden state, "the dream outran the
reality."[12] The Okies of the 1930s "found
their California dream transformed into a
nightmare,' notes Walter Stein.[13] As a
result, "the California Dream is a love
affair with an idea, a marriage to a myth"
[14]

Psychology
Observers report a common stereotyped
perception that people are happier in
California. This perception is anchored in
the perceived superiority of the California
climate, and is justified to some extent by
the fact that Californians are indeed
more satisfied with their climate than are
Midwesterners, with much of California
enjoying a Mediterranean climate.
Surveys of students show the
advantages of life in California were not
reflected in differences in the self-
reported overall life satisfaction of those
who live there.[15]

20th century
Historian Kevin Starr in his seven-volume
history of the state has explored in great
depth the "California Dream"—the
realization by ordinary Californians of the
American Dream. California starting in
the late 19th century promised the
highest possible standard of life for the
middle classes, and indeed for the skilled
blue collar workers and farm owners as
well. Poverty existed, but was
concentrated among the migrant farm
workers made famous in The Grapes of
Wrath, where the Joad family, driven out
of the Dust Bowl, searches for the
California Dream. By the 1950s the Joads
and the other "Okies" and "Arkies"
(migrants from Oklahoma and Arkansas)
were achieving the dream too. It was not
so much the upper class (who preferred
to live in New York and Boston). The
California Dream meant an improved and
more affordable family life: a small but
stylish and airy house marked by a
fluidity of indoor and outdoor space, such
as the ubiquitous California bungalow
and a lush backyard—the stage, that is,
for quiet family life in a sunny climate. It
meant very good jobs, excellent roads,
plentiful facilities for outdoor recreation,
and the schools and universities that
were the best in the world by the 1940s.
James M. Cain, an eastern writer who
visited the Golden State, reported in 1933
that the archetypal Californian
"addresses you in easy grammar,
completes his sentences, shows
familiarity with good manners, and in
addition gives you a pleasant smile."[16]
Cultural phenomena which have fed into
the California Dream include the rise of
the Hollywood film industry, Silicon
Valley, California's aerospace industry,
the California wine industry and the
Dotcom boom. The phrase has been
used in describing Californian's struggles
to find a suitable location in the state to
achieve success, in 2017, when the cost
of living in places like the San Francisco
Bay Area were prohibitive.[17]

The phrase "Taking the Cure" has been

used to describe 1950s "u-haul" migrants
who, after a year or so pined for home.[18]
Popular culture

1907 sheet music for Glorious

S outhern California

The term has been referenced in

numerous media, most notably in the
song title California Dreamin', with
"California dreaming" used in book and
film titles that reference some aspect of
the California Dream, such as the 2007
film California Dreaming, and the 2005 UK
reality TV series California Dreaming.
Lawrence Donegan's California Dreaming:
A Smooth-running, Low-mileage, Cut-price
American Adventure references the
California, (and American) Dream. Also
referencing it is poet Christopher
Buckley's Sleepwalk: California dreamin'
and a last dance with the '60s. Numerous
songs have been written about the
California Dream.[19]

See also
Blue Sky Dream: A Memoir of America's
Fall from Grace, related memoir on the
California aerospace industry and
associated culture
California Dreamin' (disambiguation)
History of California
 Californication, the complete opposite
of the California Dream

Further reading
Brands, H.W. The age of gold: the
California Gold Rush and the new
American dream (2003). ISBN 978-0-
385-72088-5.
Davie, Michael. California: The
Vanishing Dream (1973)

Matthews, Glenna. Silicon Valley,

Women, and the California Dream:
Gender, Class, and Opportunity in the
Twentieth Century (2002)

Schkade, David A., and Daniel

Kahneman. "Does Living in California
Make People Happy? A Focusing
Illusion in Judgments of Life
Satisfaction," Psychological Science,
September 1998 vol. 9, # 5, pp. 340–46
doi:10.1111/1467-9280.00066 (https://
doi.org/10.1111%2F1467-9280.0006
6) online version (http://psiexp.ss.uci.e
du/research/teaching/Schkade_Kahne
man_1998.pdf) Archived (https://web.
archive.org/web/20100609234114/htt
p://psiexp.ss.uci.edu/research/teachin
g/Schkade_Kahneman_1998.pdf)
June 9, 2010, at the Wayback Machine
Starr, Kevin.
Starr, Kevin California: A History
(2005), a synthesis in 370 pp.
Americans and the California
Dream, 1850–1915 (1973)

Inventing the Dream: California

through the Progressive Era (1986)

Material Dreams: Southern

California through the 1920s
(1991), cultural, social and
political history excerpt and text
search (https://www.amazon.co
m/dp/019507260X)
Endangered Dreams: The Great
Depression in California (1997)
excerpt and text search (https://w
ww.amazon.com/dp/019511802
2)
 The Dream Endures: California
Enters the 1940s (1997)

Embattled Dreams: California in

War and Peace, 1940–1950 (2003),
excerpt and text search (https://w
ww.amazon.com/dp/019516897
6)
Golden Dreams: California in an
Age of Abundance, 1950–1963
(2009) excerpt and text search (htt
ps://www.amazon.com/dp/01951
53774)
Coast of Dreams: California on the
Edge, 1990–2003. (2004). 784 pp.

References
1. Kevin Starr, Americans and the California
 Dream, 1850–1915 (1986)

2. Warren, Louis S. (May 1, 2023). "The

California DreamHistory of a Myth" (http
s://online.ucpress.edu/phr/article/92/2/2
60/196072/The-California-DreamHistory-
of-a-Myth) . Pacific Historical Review. 92
(2): 260–298.
doi:10.1525/phr.2023.92.2.260 (https://d
oi.org/10.1525%2Fphr.2023.92.2.260) .
ISSN 0030-8684 (https://www.worldcat.or
g/issn/0030-8684) . S2CID 258624023 (h
ttps://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:2
58624023) .

3. Starr, Americans and the California Dream

and Starr, Inventing the Dream (1985)

4. Brands, 2003), p. 442.

5. Robert A. Burchell, "The Loss of a
Reputation; or, The Image of California in
Britain before 1875," California Historical
Quarterly 53 (Summer I974): 115–30,
shows that stories about Gold Rush
lawlessness deterred immigration for two
decades.

6. Starr, 2005), p. 110.

7. See, e.g., Signal Hill, California,
Bakersfield, California; Los Angeles,
California

8. Leading studios include 20th Century Fox,

MGM, Paramount, RKO, Warner Bros.,
Universal Pictures, Columbia Pictures, and
United Artists

9. Such as Hughes Aircraft, Douglas Aircraft,

North American Aviation, Northrop, and
Lockheed Aircraft.
10. Warren A. Beck, David A. Williams,
California: a history of the Golden State
(1972) p. 487

11. Elisabeth Orr, "Joy Neugebauer

Purchasing the California Dream in
Postwar Suburbia," ch 12 in The human
tradition in California ed. by Clark Davis,
David Igler (2002)

12. Starr (1985) p. viii

13. Walter Stein, California and the Dust Bowl
Migration (1973) p. 26

14. Claudia K. Jurmain, California: a place, a

people, a dream (1986) p. 141

15. Schkade and Kahneman. "Does Living in

California Make People Happy?" (1998)
16. Starr, Kevin (2009). Golden Dreams :
California in an Age of Abundance, 1950-
1963 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/778
339550) . Oxford: Oxford University
Press. ISBN 978-0-19-992430-1.
OCLC 778339550 (https://www.worldcat.
org/oclc/778339550) .

17. "Bay Area residents seek the California

dream — in Sacramento" (https://www.me
rcurynews.com/2017/11/18/bay-area-res
idents-seek-the-california-dream-in-sacra
mento/) . November 18, 2017.

18. CITATION NEEDED

19. "Sheet music is the soundtrack of the
California dream" (https://www.latimes.co
m/local/great-reads/la-et-ms-los-angeles-
sheet-music-20130529-dto-htmlstory.htm
l) . Los Angeles Times. May 29, 2013.
Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=California_Dream&oldid=1185268815"

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