There are men who in their personalities and careers seem to embody the vital spirit of their age. Such was Sam Brannan. In the era of the final great thrust westward to the Pacific, the discovery of gold, and the vast speculations that saw huge fortunes swiftly gained and lost, Sam Brannan stood out as one of the most daring of the breed of rugged individualists who set their mark so vividly upon the West. His is the story of a man who became a living legend as one of California's first great empire builders, a supreme gambler who knew both triumph and disaster—but never the meaning of fear.

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