In 1987, the Lassen County Superintendent of School’s office relocated from the old Roosevelt School in Susanville to the former Eagle Lake Ranger District’s Office of the Lassen National Forest near the Susanville airport. As the case may be, in moving process items are known to get tossed.

Some interesting old photographs and albums were tossed. Among those was an a collection of nearly fifty photographs of rural Lassen County schools. They were taken in 1916, by Prof. D.M. Durst, Principal of Lassen High School. For a number of the schools, this is the only photograph record of the buildings. At this time, the county allowed individuals to salvage at the Bass Hill Landfill. A man approached me with the Durst photographs that he salvaged from the dump. After some negotiations I paid him sixty dollars for them. A couple days later he contacted me again, as he as had some old 1920s photograph albums related to the Susanville Rotary Club. His asking price was too much for my limited means. I learned later that he did find a buyer.

Tim