By the end of 1852, six months after the establishment in San Francisco of the principal office, Wells, Fargo & Company had spread its express and banking services well into California's gold-mining country. The most tangible evidence of the organization's growth was the rise in value of its gold shipments to New York. The first shipment, which left San Francisco on July 31 aboard the Pacific Mail Steamship Oregon, crossed the Isthmus of Panama, and was taken up the eastern coast of the continent aboard the United States Mail Steamship Ohio, amounted to only $21,717. The year's last shipment, almost tripling the first, was $61,615. The largest was sent on December 1 and amounted to $68,735. Total shipments by Wells, Fargo & Company for the five-month period between July 31 and the end of the year were $312,492. San Francisco's largest banking firm, Page, Bacon & Company, shipped during the same period $6,313,986, and Adams & Company, competitor of Wells, Fargo & Company in the express and banking business, $5,542,000.