From an article "Grub Stakes and Millions" in Harper's magazine, Volume 60, February, 1880:

"What brought men out here [to California] was that they were just dead broke at home—just dead broke, I tell you: '57 had done that. These men were ready for a new country—had to find something—and they came out across the plains when there wasn't a thing here but Indians. Why, we old fellows have a round up 'most every year in Denver, and talk and laugh over those times. We were all alike—nobody had any money—all cleaned out before we skipped out from home. No one had done anything to be ashamed of; but it was a regular amalgamation of busted people, who left their country for their country's good, and their own. If you'd meet a man, and be introduced to him as Mr. Jones, it was all right to ask him, 'What was your name in the States, Mr. Jones?'"