On Friday afternoon, August 15, Greg will sign copies of his book at the Wells Fargo History Museum in San Francisco. We're very proud of his achievement, and we invite everyone to come and pat him on the back. Of course, you should insist he spell your name right! (CR)

I have not written for the Guided by History blog very often this year for a number of reasons. Much of my time has been allotted to a book I have been working on for a year. This book, my first publication, was released by Arcadia Publishing  on June 2nd.

The title is A History of Alcatraz Island: 1853-2008  and it is part of Arcadia's "Images of America" series. This is the same series for which Bob Chandler wrote the volume about Wells Fargo .

Having finished the book, I wanted to find a historical connection between Wells Fargo and Alcatraz Island for GBH. Well, an opportunity actually presented itself on my birthday this year! As I put up a "This Day in Wells Fargo History" flyer in the Old Sacramento museum, I found out that Wells Fargo shipped soldiers from Alcatraz to Nevada in 1860.

Some may not know that Alcatraz was originally designed as a fort to help defend the San Francisco Bay. Military construction on Alcatraz began in 1853, and the islandremained under military control until 1933. As a fort, Alcatraz had artillery and soldiers — on May 15, 1860, Wells Fargo & Co.'s Express shipped a "company of artillery from Fort Alcatraz" to Placerville, and then to Nevada. These soldiers and artillery reinforced volunteer troops fighting in Nevada near Pyramid Lake .

The soldiers were sent over the Sierra Nevada, via Placerville, by Wells Fargo agent Theodore Tracy. Theodore is a brother of Wells Fargo's famed Sacramento agent Felix Tracy, whom I wrote about a while ago.

There is little else about the shipment that is interesting, but it allowed me to find the Wells Fargo connection. And if nothing else, someone working at Wells Fargo has something to do with Alcatraz, yesterday and today!