Alvinza Hayward was a well-known gold mining millionaire who made his fortune in California. He later became a prominent financier

Financier

Financier is a term for a person who handles typically large sums of money, usually involving money lending, financing projects, large-scale investing, or large-scale money management. The term is French, and derives from finance or payment...

 and businessman in the San Francisco bay area.

Early life

Born in Vermont

Vermont

Vermont is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state ranks 43rd in land area, , and 45th in total area. Its population according to the 2010 census, 630,337, is the second smallest in the country, larger only than Wyoming. It is the only New England...

, Hayward moved to Canton

Canton (village), New York

Canton is a village in St. Lawrence County, New York, United States. The village is centrally located in both the town of Canton and the county of St. Lawrence. The population was 5,882 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of St. Lawrence County...

, New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

 early in his life. He studied law in New York, but also pursued lumber

Lumber

Lumber or timber is wood in any of its stages from felling through readiness for use as structural material for construction, or wood pulp for paper production....

 and lead

Lead

Lead is a main-group element in the carbon group with the symbol Pb and atomic number 82. Lead is a soft, malleable poor metal. It is also counted as one of the heavy metals. Metallic lead has a bluish-white color after being freshly cut, but it soon tarnishes to a dull grayish color when exposed...

 mining interests.

California

His experience in Michigan vein

Vein (geology)

In geology, a vein is a distinct sheetlike body of crystallized minerals within a rock. Veins form when mineral constituents carried by an aqueous solution within the rock mass are deposited through precipitation...

 mining proved invaluable after his move to California in the Gold Rush

California Gold Rush

The California Gold Rush began on January 24, 1848, when gold was found by James W. Marshall at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California. The first to hear confirmed information of the gold rush were the people in Oregon, the Sandwich Islands , and Latin America, who were the first to start flocking to...

 of 1850. After buying an interest in the Eureka

Eureka

Eureka may refer to:* Eureka , a famous exclamation attributed to Archimedes* Eureka effect, the sudden, unexpected realization of the solution to a problem- Canada :* Eureka, Nova Scotia in Canada* Eureka, Nunavut in Canada...

mine in Amador County, Hayward made new investments and successfully extracted gold where others had failed, later selling shares in a mine which was said to have yielded more than $5,000,000.

Many more successful mining ventures followed, including the Utica/Selkirk mine near Angels Camp, in which Hayward acquired a shrewd one-third interest in the 1880s after consulting with a medium

Mediumship

Mediumship is described as a form of communication with spirits. It is a practice in religious beliefs such as Spiritualism, Spiritism, Espiritismo, Candomblé, Voodoo and Umbanda.- Concept :...

 (who examined a quartz sample). In 1901, the near-vertical Utica quartz deposit — twice abandoned, and once believed so unworkable it traded hands for just $50 — was said to have yielded the single richest gold deposit in California. After heavy investment, more than $7,000,000 in gold was removed from Utica, and up to $900,000 in gold bullion was extracted in a single month.

Known in his later life as a "Silver Baron," Hayward also held a significant interest in the silver

Silver

Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...

-producing Comstock Lode

Comstock Lode

The Comstock Lode was the first major U.S. discovery of silver ore, located under what is now Virginia City, Nevada, on the eastern slope of Mount Davidson, a peak in the Virginia Range. After the discovery was made public in 1859, prospectors rushed to the area and scrambled to stake their claims...

 after 1864. Hayward also found financial success in timber, coal

Coal

Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...

, railroads

Rail transport

Rail transport is a means of conveyance of passengers and goods by way of wheeled vehicles running on rail tracks. In contrast to road transport, where vehicles merely run on a prepared surface, rail vehicles are also directionally guided by the tracks they run on...

, San Francisco real estate

Real estate

In general use, esp. North American, 'real estate' is taken to mean "Property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals, or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this; an item of real property; buildings or...

, and banking. Hayward was a director of the Bank of California

Bank of California

The Bank of California was opened in San Francisco, California, on July 4, 1864, by William Chapman Ralston. It was the first commercial bank in the Western United States, the second-richest bank in the nation, and considered instrumental in developing the American Old West.-History:The ancestor of...

, and in 1870 was one of the original investors in the San Francisco City Gas Company, which would eventually become the Pacific Gas and Electric Company

Pacific Gas and Electric Company

The Pacific Gas and Electric Company , commonly known as PG&E, is the utility that provides natural gas and electricity to most of the northern two-thirds of California, from Bakersfield almost to the Oregon border...

.

A locomotive on the Black Diamond Coal Mining Railroad

Black Diamond Coal Mining Railroad

The Black Diamond Coal Mining Railroad was 5.9 miles long and ran from Black Diamond Landing, California to Nortonville, California. It was owned and operated by the Black Diamond Coal Mining Company and therefore did not have its own official name. Over the years, it has been known by at least...

 was named for him in the 1860's.

The US Geologic Survey Geographic Names Information System

Geographic Names Information System

The Geographic Names Information System is a database that contains name and locative information about more than two million physical and cultural features located throughout the United States of America and its territories. It is a type of gazetteer...

 states the city of Hayward

Hayward, California

Hayward is a city located in the East Bay in Alameda County, California. With a population of 144,186, Hayward is the sixth largest city in the San Francisco Bay Area and the third largest in Alameda County. Hayward was ranked as the 37th most populous municipality in California. It is included in...

 was named after him. This is disputed by historians.

Family life

Whether true or not, Hayward was often called California’s "first millionaire," and in his lifetime was frequently referred to as “the richest man in California.” Grandiose and eccentric by turns, Hayward turned even more strongly to Spiritualism in his later years, using mediums to predict business investments (with poor results). Hayward had a difficult relationship with his wife, Charity (1826-1905), whom he married in Wisconsin in the 1840s; their first son, James, was born in 1846, and would die of consumption at age 27. Divorced in 1878, the couple remarried again later that year only to separate again, living the rest of their lives apart. Only two of the couple's eight children survived to adulthood; six others died of mysterious respiratory ailments early in life, prompting recent speculation that Charity Hayward may have had a role in their demise.

Hayward Park, his 800 acres (3.2 km²) estate in San Mateo

San Mateo, California

San Mateo is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area. With a population of approximately 100,000 , it is one of the larger suburbs on the San Francisco Peninsula, located between Burlingame to the north, Foster City to the east, Belmont to the south,...

, included a lake, race track, and deer park. The spectacular 1880 residence was converted into a hotel after Hayward’s death. It burned in a 1920 fire.