The founders of the American Express Company, Henry Wells, William G. Fargo, and associates, organized Wells, Fargo and Company in 1852 to function as a western ally of American Express. The two companies divided the continent approximately at the Mississippi and Missouri rivers. Wells, Fargo and Company installed ocean service between New York and San Francisco via Panama, erected a fine office building in San Francisco, and began to operate not only in the gold region of California but over the entire Pacific coast. In less than ten years, it had eliminated or acquired nearly all competitors and dominated the Far West. In remote mining camps where the mails had not yet penetrated, it was the chief letter carrier; even after the mails came, many preferred it as more dependable. The company spread rapidly through the entire Rocky Mountain region and carried far greater amounts of gold, silver, and bullion than any other agency. In 1861, after the famous Pony Express failed, Wells, Fargo acquired it and extended its operations to western Canada, Alaska, Mexico, the West Indies, Central America, and Hawaii, and for a short time even carried letters to China and Japan. Later, it pushed its service eastward to the Atlantic coast. Along with all the other expresses, Wells, Fargo and Company merged with the American Railway Express Company in 1918, but continued to function for more than thirty years as a separate corporation on fourteen thousand miles of railway in Mexico and Cuba. As a subsidiary of American Express, Wells, Fargo became an armored-car service.
Bibliography
Beebe, Lucius, and Charles Clegg. U.S. West: The Saga of Wells Fargo. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1949.
Hungerford, Edward. Wells Fargo: Advancing the American Frontier. New York: Random House, 1949.
