[1] The two boys were trained to work alongside Bourn the elder and learned about business dealings and mining.

[1] His father accidentally shot himself in the stomach in their San Francisco Nob Hill home and died in July 1874.

[1] A few months later in 1875, he left for England and a classical education at Sidney Sussex College of Cambridge University.

In 1888 he partnered with E. Everett Wise and other investors to build the mammoth Greystone Cellars in Napa Valley.

Bourn was regularly pilloried by the San Francisco Chronicle as a thief and scoundrel for water rates, but Bourn replied that the company needed to earn a reasonable return on its investments and was also making provision for future population growth.