Interest Rates

When people make decision for major purchases (home, car, etc.), a factor that drives the final decision is the interest rate that will be charged. Interest rate can either make or break the deal.

What was the interest rate during the gold rush at the time the Saints were purchasing land in the San Bernardino, California colony area?

     A)                 3% per month

     B)                 3% per year

     C)                 1% per month

     D)                 1% per year

Yesterday’s answer:

     a.      The number of deaths from cholera

John Martin wrote that cholera caused the death of two-fifths of all Saints traveling upriver from New Orleans to St. Louis in 1849. He found work burying the dead and noted that often they buried twenty-four persons a day. General voyage notes from the September 1849 voyage of the Berlin noted that forty-nine persons aboard ship died from cholera, twenty-six to twenty-eight of whom were Latter-day Saints.

Autobiography of John Martin, Ashland (February 1849), Mormon Immigration Index, CD-ROM.