The Wakamatsu Tea and Silk Farm, established in 1869 about 5km north of Placerville at Gold Hill, is believed to have been the first permanent Japanese settlement in North America. A group of Japanese colonists arrived from Aizu, in northern Japan — recent refugees from the Boshin War, the civil war that ended the samurai era — bringing tea plants, silk cocoons, bamboo, and the knowledge of sericulture.
The colony failed within two years: California's climate and soils were wrong for tea cultivation, and the enterprise went bankrupt. Most of the colonists returned to Japan, but one, Okei Ito, died here and is believed to be the first Japanese immigrant to die in the United States. A small memorial near the original farm site marks her grave. The site (now the Wakamatsu Farm) is a California Historical Landmark.