Category Archives: History

History

The Sagebrush Darrow

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Plumas County Courthouse

Hardin “Finn” Barry was a well known Susanville attorney who had a practice there from 1921 until his passing in 1969. In 1935, Finn represented Mrs. Emma Elam, a Maidu, in Plumas County, who was charged with murdering her husband with an ax. According to news reports, Barry won an acquittal for Mrs. Elam and at the end of the trial served an order on the sheriff demanding the return of the  woman’s ax. In addition, Barry stipulated that the ax be sharpened because it had dulled while being held for evidence. The demand was so unusual that it made national news.

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History

Westwood’s First Railroad Shipments

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Construction train in the Susan River Canyon.

In February 1914, the Fernley & Lassen Railroad reached Westwood. This was welcomed news, since the newly founded community was cut-off from the rest of the world. The first rail shipment to Westwood was a carload of hay. Some today, may find that peculiar. However, the town heavily relied upon horses for most everything. While there were a handful automobiles there, with the heavy snows that winter, they were totally useless.  On the other hand, for the railroad’s return trip, 12 million board feet of high grade lumber awaited it. After all, that was the main purpose for the railroad to be constructed in the first place.

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History

Where are we – the answer

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August 9, 2018

Built circa 1910, as the residence of Charles Hurlbut, whose family operated a nearby sawmill. In 1938, the California Division of Foresty purchased a two-acre parcel of the Hurlbut ranch in the timber just west of Willow Creek Valley. They established a fire station there and operated until the early 1960s. In 1971, the State donated the parcel to Lassen Community College.

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History

Taylor Grazing Act

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Huffords
Hufford’s Sheep Camp, Eagle Lake, 1921.

Back in August I wrote about the Laxalt family and that Dominique was a tramp/itinerant sheepman. In 1934, the Taylor Grazing Act eliminated that practice.  The Act changed grazing practices on federal lands wherein no policy was in place. This basically pertained the sagebrush lands of the intermountain west. It should be noted that federal lands administered by the national forest service had implemented their own grazing policy. In 1946, the Government Land Office and the Taylor Grazing Service were merged to form the Bureau of Land Management.

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History

A Western Pacific Request

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The Western Pacific Depot, Doyle, 1915. Courtesy of Suzanne Pratt

I recently request concerning the Western Pacific Railroad. “Do you have any photos or data about when Long Valley Creek roared and washed out the Western Pacific’s large culvert just north of Doyle during World War II? I remember when it happened, but not the year I remember the trestle built to keep the trains running, while the current structure was being built.” Can anyone help?

In a similar vein, does anyone have photographs of the tracks near Doyle when a portion of the railroad bed was washed away during the floods of January 2017?

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History

Alturas Depot

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The NCO Depot, Alturas, 1921

In December 1908, the NCO Railroad finally made it all the way north to Alturas.  One would think the residents would be thrilled, but with a major increase of frieght rates, it had a chilling effect. Then, when the NCO built its passenger depot on 12th Street, far from everything else in town, the residents complained. To appease the situation, the railroad carefully disassembled the stone depot, numbering each stone, and once dismantled the stones were reassembled at the new location on  Fourth Street. The depot closed in 1938, and in 1962, the Alturas Garden Club took over the property and still maintains it.

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History

Found—An Honest Man

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Karlo
Karlo, Secret Valley, 1920

That was the sideline article that appeared in the Lassen Mail of January 31, 1930. The main headline was the barbaric murder of Robert L. Smith, railroad gang foreman at Karlo.  The Mail wrote: “In addition to establishing the record as the most brutal crime in the history of Lassen County, the murder at Karlo last Sunday morning also established a peak of honesty that will stand for some time.

”While Coroner Edenholm was handling the burned body at the scene of the crime, one of the track laborers came up to him and giving him $25, told him that he owed that amount to the dead man.”

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History

Westwood Bond Measure

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Birch Street, Westwood. Courtesy of Hank Martinez

Many may not realize that Red River Lumber Company sold bonds with two Minnesota banks to finance the construction of Westwood.  After all, the initial cost to construct Westwood was $3,528,300. While sorting through the T.B. Walker papers, there was some interesting correspondence on this topic. Even with T.B. Walker’s wealth—one of wealthiest people in the United States—the banks were leery. There concern was real, especially in family operations such as Red River. Edward Decker of Northwestern National Bank informed T.B., that his concern was with his heirs, that in many causes quarrels and misunderstandings occur and eventually leading to the failure of the enterprise. However, Decker had witnessed T.B.’s five sons working together in harmony and felt confident with approval of $2 million in bonds. However, Decker was no fool, and secured a mortgage to Red River’s timberlands in Shasta and Tehama Counties. Decker’s initial thoughts came true, when shortly after T.B. Walker’s death in 1927, that Red River defaulted on a bond balloon payment, and thus the numerous financial difficulties to be encountered down the road.

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History

Lassen Peak Lookout

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The remains from the first eruptions of September 1914

It is somewhat amazing to the think that fire lookouts more or less ran the course of just little over a century.  While there are still manned fire lookouts, they are few and far between.

In 1911, the Lassen National Forest Service implemented its fire lookout program.  Lassen Peak, at an elevation of 10,457 feet was the highest point in the forest, and so it was only natural that a lookout be placed there. In 1912, the first attempt was made, it was a crude arrangement that did not function. The following a year, with a new design, a portable structure could be hauled by pack animals.  In June 1913, mules were used to pack the lookout building for Lassen, at least to its base. At that point, man was designated the beast of burden. It took four men, two days and sixteen trips to lug all the pieces and the sparse furnishings to the top of Lassen. W.H. Packard, of Woodland would be the only person to man the lookout for two seasons. In the fall of 1914, the lookout was destroyed by numerous volcanic eruptions.

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