[3] In 1849, when the California Gold Rush occurred, Lewis moved to San Francisco, California, taking his printing press, and after editing a newspaper there for a short time, he took as a partner a relative and established the Los Angeles Star in Los Angeles.
[4][2] Foster's printing shop was located opposite the Bell block, which stood on the south-east corner of Aliso and Los Angeles streets.
"[5]The prospect of establishing a newspaper in mid-nineteenth century Los Angeles proved to be somewhat difficult and something of an experiment for Lewis.
The closest major source of news was San Francisco, which was more than 500 miles distant, where Lewis had to depend on the mails, either by sea or overland, which took anywhere from two to six weeks to arrive.
The remainder of his life was spent in Boston, where he died on November 2, 1885, at the age of 65; he is buried at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Massachusetts.