Sarah Finley was the daughter of a minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Despite health concerns that precipitated the Finleys’ return to California in 1872, she lived to be 89 years old, passing away in 1937. Finley was a leader of the suffrage movement in Sonoma County, California. Thomas Houseworth & Co. was one of the leading photography studios in San Francisco in the 1870s and 1880s.
This image shows some of the preparatory and college level students enrolled at the time. The 1872-73 college catalog lists ninety-eight students at all levels, including twenty-six “agricultural students.”
From back left: Frank Cauthorn, Newton Addison Thompson, George P. Lent, and Isaac Jacobs. Addie M. Allen and Minnie M. White are the women in the photo. Addie M. Allen married Newton Addison Thompson and Minnie M. White married O.A.C. Pres. B. L. Arnold.