1700s California gold rush

Well, Spain is not going to give up California and Texas. Just as they traded interests in Florida for Britain's interests in Cuba, they will negotiate borders with the Oregon and Louisiana (Missouri) Territories. In any case, California and Texas are Spanish speaking, along with the mountain territories in between.
 
Well, Spain is not going to give up California and Texas. Just as they traded interests in Florida for Britain's interests in Cuba, they will negotiate borders with the Oregon and Louisiana (Missouri) Territories. In any case, California and Texas are Spanish speaking, along with the mountain territories in between.

Unlikely. Where is Spain going to get the manpower from to settle the region with Spanish speakers? The homeland is already suffering from a population shortage, and the colonies are fairly scarcely populated. Throwing what settlers you have north is liable to get them slaughtered by the (still highly competitive) Amerindians.
 
Unlikely. Where is Spain going to get the manpower from to settle the region with Spanish speakers? The homeland is already suffering from a population shortage, and the colonies are fairly scarcely populated. Throwing what settlers you have north is liable to get them slaughtered by the (still highly competitive) Amerindians.

They wouldn't be settling it all at once. They would be concentrating on the mineral rich areas and their presence would control the ports.

There's also the possibility that Britain decides its a good time to reassert Drake's claim.

Given the British dominance in the North Atlantic, the Spanish might be willing to compromise Florida at an earlier time, and even some interests in the West Indies in order to strengthen the claim on California.
 

SwampTiger

Banned
As someone with French Acadian blood, I would expect the Spanish to follow the same path as they did in the Louisiane territory. They invited Catholics from Europe and French North America to settle in the newly Spanish territories. Spain still had ties to Naples and Sicily. With the prospect of gold and silver, you would see a large influx from those areas. Filipinos and other Asians would follow, as they did in other Central and South American colonies.
 
Unlikely. Where is Spain going to get the manpower from to settle the region with Spanish speakers? The homeland is already suffering from a population shortage, and the colonies are fairly scarcely populated. Throwing what settlers you have north is liable to get them slaughtered by the (still highly competitive) Amerindians.

That's exactly what they did with Nuevo México and Tejas though. And unlike Nuevo México and Tejas, here the main purpose isn't to be a buffer state for the actual mining regions like Chihuahua and Zacatecas, it is an actual mining region and thus highly important to the Spanish crown. So probably a significant amount of settlers who otherwise went to Nuevo México and Tejas will instead go to California.
 
That's exactly what they did with Nuevo México and Tejas though. And unlike Nuevo México and Tejas, here the main purpose isn't to be a buffer state for the actual mining regions like Chihuahua and Zacatecas, it is an actual mining region and thus highly important to the Spanish crown. So probably a significant amount of settlers who otherwise went to Nuevo México and Tejas will instead go to California.

And what exactly happened in those regions? They ended up as extremely underpopulated military outposts which couldn't be considered economically productive and did a rather poor job at their one other duty: protecting trade, settlers, and the missions from Amerindian encroachment. To the point New Mexico and Texas could be co-opted passively by the Yanquis via settlement that was actively encouraged in the end due to lack of willing Catholic Latin emigrants

I'll admit California is certainly better, in the end result, as a more profitable and secure zone of settlement, but you'd need some pretty substantial initial capital investment to create a "California Trail" to connect it to the broader New Spain economy. Especially if, as you say, those settlers that IOTL provided the presence Spain had in NM and T are instead moving further north. Now that I've put some more thought into it though... that means a Cali that's more economically independent of and isolated from New Spain proper, more prosperous and populous in general, and likely given more direct individual attention by the Spanish Crown. If we concede that Mexico comes out smaller and weaker (likely losing more territory on the Gulf coast to the US in the end as well, due to less settlement and attention/development in the region in developmental stages and the snowballing demographic and economic effects), than the formation of a separate Viceroyalty of California that establishes itself as a separate polity when the Empire crumbles could very well have the basis to survive.
 
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