"Hey, what is this?

Gold!

Yellow, glowing, precious gold!

No, gods, I am not an idle believer; All I need you to do is give me some roots!

This thing, with just a little bit, can turn the black into white, the ugly into beautiful, the wrong into right, the humble into noble, the old into a young man, and the coward into a warrior. ”

- Shakespeare, Timon of Athens

The allure of money is unstoppable, and even in the wake of war, California's population is still growing explosively, from 450,000 to 500,000 before the war, and is growing at a rate of 10% per year.

How fast is that? In India, as we know it today, its population is growing at just 0.8 percent, while California is now 12.5 times larger.

At this rate, California will have a population of 3.7 million in 20 years, but that is almost impossible, because sooner or later the gold mines will dry up, and without gold the land will no longer have such a great charm.

Although the alchemy technology of the Austrian Empire at this time far exceeded the level of the same period in history, and the utilization rate was constantly increasing, it is an indisputable fact that gold is a non-renewable resource.

And in the future, the land under the control of the Austro-Mexican joint development company will not be limited to California, in fact, Franz is now studying how to develop land in Nevada.

However, unlike California's abundant natural environment, Nevada's climate is hot, arid, with high summers and cold winters.

Nevada's topography is complex and diverse, including mountains, deserts, plateaus, basins, and canyons, among others. In addition to the common wild wolves and black bears, there are also Nevada brown spiders and Nevada scorch-tailed scorpions.

Not to mention the mysterious Bigfoot and brain-eating bugs, if it weren't for the hundreds of nuclear tests conducted by Lao Mei in Nevada in later generations, God knows what monsters could be found inside.

The local Shoshone people say that Chernobyl or something is weak, and that the local area bears 48 times more radiation than Hiroshima.

Colonizing such a poor mountain and water, Franz was naturally reluctant to waste precious German immigrants. In fact, the most suitable for the local area are the Indians, who have the highest adaptability.

But this group of guys is weak in terms of development and ability to explore resources. In addition, there is a high probability of mutiny, or even a joint attack on the Austro-Mexican United Development Company by the local Indians and Americans.

Therefore, Franz needed a group of "faithful, reliable" and "hard-working" colonial advance teams. This was not just for the sake of California, but in fact the Austrian colonies were still very short of people.

After all, the Irish have been enslaved by the British for a long time, and it is inevitable that there will be some demons, and there can be Irish people in the colony, but the proportion should not be too high, let alone make it a large gathering place.

In fact, the United States had a lot of trouble assimilating the Irish, one of which was the large number of gangsters and mobs.

Later generations only knew the Italian mafia in black clothes and black hats holding Thomson, but they did not know the Irish gangsters who were countless times more terrible than it.

While the Italian mafia can easily beat the Irish in terms of expertise, the latter has more stealth and more ambitious goals than the former.

In fact, it can be put to a simpler way, that is, the Italian mafia cares about money, while the Irish gangsters care more about power.

While the Italians were still spilling blood in the streets, the Irish had quietly mastered a more effective weapon – power.

As the U.S. is rapidly urbanizing, no president has been able to keep up with infrastructure and management systems.

This created a large power vacuum, and the Irish gangsters spontaneously became the underground bosses of these new cities.

Historically, it was called U BOSS, which literally translates to underground boss, but Franz felt that it was more appropriate to translate it as underground mayor.

This is well reflected in the American drama "Mayor of Kingston" starring Hawkeye Saint Zelen Corgi, although the plot is very burning, it is still a story of Huang Shilang's whitewashing, and he doesn't even bother to wash it, and directly tells you that the world should be like this.

To a certain extent, this kind of political gang seems to alleviate local contradictions and establish a "suitable" local order.

However, these guys and good guys really don't have anything to do with each other, because they are themselves a source of chaos.

Although the Irish in the Great Famine are pitiful, it would be better if Franz exchanged the safety and happiness of his own people, after all, indifference in this world can solve 99% of problems (this sentence is a matter of opinion, do not copy and copy, believe that the world is beautiful and the future is bright).

In fact, except for Franz, who was looking for labor, the Americans were not idle.

Historically, in 1845, Asa Whitney proposed to the U.S. Congress to build a railroad across the North American continent, and many American elites discussed the construction of railroads.

But now that the Mexican-American War has been lost, and California and Nevada are not in the hands of the Americans, Franz feels that something may not happen again.

But the reality is that the Americans still intend to build a transcontinental railroad, but no longer through Nevada and California, but directly to Oregon.

The reason is very strange, that is, the whaling industry in the United States needs this railway, and at the same time, more than 100,000 Americans were blocked by less than 2,000 British, which is really unbearable.

James Polk's two main slogans for president were to fight slavery and "reoccupy" Oregon.

He always presented himself as a tough guy, and even said to the British, "If you want 49 degrees north latitude, you still want war".

Although the United States won the Mexican-American War, the losses were staggering, and with the disbandment of the army, yellow fever began to spread throughout the country, killing too many people to count.

The armies of the northern factory owners were defeated in the war, while the armies of the southern slave owners suffered little loss because they had been on guard against the French.

As a result, the Southern slave owners became stronger, and even claimed that they had invited the French, so that the United States could turn the corner.

However, this point was highly controversial, because the generals of the Northern Army insisted that Austria and Mexico were long overdue, and that the United States could have won the final victory without the French, and that it was not necessary to divide half of the fruits of victory.

Both sides disagreed, but one thing was certain, and that was that the power in the South was stronger at this time, so Polk would never dare to touch slavery.

Historically, Polk did not "dictate" slavery itself, although Democrats have always claimed.

"James Polk was a lifelong fighter for democracy and freedom, capable, upright, and unbridled."

But in reality, he always wanted them to be "young, effective" and cheap.

(End of chapter)