“The two gold pieces that Papa carried concealed in his clothes were a marriage gift from my Grandfather Spurling in Monterey, California(15)”.
-The California Goldrush began in 1848 in Coloma, California. From then on it was a rush to find as much gold as possible in the American River. The population of San Francisco exploded from 1,000 in 1848 to 25,000 full-time residents by 1850, all in search of money. This was a crazy, greedy period with many robberies and murders over money. It is assumed that “Grandfather Spurling” received these gold pieces during the gold rush. It is possible that Portis had Tom Chaney steal them from Mattie’s father to symbolize the greed that Chaney had for money, and the greed that all the people who went hunting for gold had during the rush. Portis could also have meant to have the two gold pieces symbolize Mattie and her father. Mattie goes on a quest to retrieve the gold pieces and only ever gets one of them back. That one represents herself, who she finds more of on her adventure, while the missing one represents her father, who she will never see again.
Love that thinking in the 2nd half especially -- and it works how you went for a more literal analysis and then got more conceptual and figurative.
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