Tom Maguire: An Irish Impresario in 19th Century San Francisco

In partnership with Hinterland.

Glen Gendzel, San Jose State University historian, looks at the rollercoaster career of Tom Maguire, son of New York Irish pre-Famine immigrants. Maguire was an illiterate taxi driver when he joined the California Gold Rush. He then rose to the top of the theater business in boomtown San Francisco, making and losing several fortunes in the process, before (spoiler alert!) he eventually went bankrupt and fled back to New York.