The first hotel in Janesville was built in 1857 by Malcolm Bankhead, which was a two-story structure made of logs. In 1872, Dennis Tanner purchased it, and torn it down. He replaced it with a much substantial larger, two-story wooden frame building, that contained 22-rooms. The hotel had numerous owners over the years. In 1913, B.R. Holmes acquired it, made numerous upgrades and changed the name to the Diamond Mountain Inn. One of its most interesting owners were the Pollocks, as in the famed artist Jackson Pollock. The hotel was destroyed by fire in 1931.

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When Dr. John A. Slater died on July 24, 1863 at Janesville, there was no cemetery. He was buried at the foot of pine tree on the Sloss Ranch, known in later years as the Jim Peterson place.

In 1865, Slater’s two sons, Henry Hunt, age 11 and John Allen age 7, died a day apart from each, respectively on May 5 and May 6. They were buried next to their father.

There was a lot of speculation as to the cause of their deaths, some attributed to it spotted fever and others said it was poison from eating wild parsnips. What was later revealed the boys had played around the house all day and never ventured away from home. Henry was taken ill with a pain in his heal in the afternoon, and died that night. On the same evening, John was reported to have a pain in his next week and died the following morning.

In the summer of 1915, John S. Partridge, a grandson of Dr. Slater, contacted local historian Granville Pullen to move the graves to the Janesville Cemetery, which Pullen obliged.

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In December 1856, Manly Thompson located near the base of this mountain and built one of the first cabins in the region. Like so many of the original settlers of the Honey Lake Valley he moved onto he did remain in the region and moved on. On October 27, 1875, Thompson sold his 276-acre ranch to James P. Sharp for $6,000 and moved to Elko, Nevada. His lasting legacy of the region is his name applied to this prominent peak.

Recently, I had accidentally stumble upon this most interesting website concerning Thompson Peak. It is worth the gander. For me it brought back some interesting memories when my brother, Gary and others, including yours truly, gave serious consideration of climbing its rock face back in the mid-1970s.

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Names of places changed quickly when the gold seekers rushed into Honey Lake Valley. This stream was a prime example. It was first called Commanche Creek, then Irishman’s Creek, and, in 1860, became known as Lakes Creek. Sometime in the early 1860s, it finally became Baxter Creek named for John Baxter (1812-1880), a native of Dundee, Scotland, who came to California in 1849 and to Honey Lake Valley in 1857. Baxter located along the lower end of the creek, about a mile east of Buntingville. On May 27, 1867, Baxter, with his partner, Edward Bartlett, sold this property to Robert C. Hayden for $3,750. This sale led to a fatal mistake for both Hayden and Bartlett.

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Dennis Tanner’s residency in Lassen County was brief but a busy one. Upon his arrival in Susanville, he installed a skating rink in the first floor of the Masonic Hotel. The following year, he purchased the Janesville Hotel, if one could call the structure. It had been built in 1856, before Janesville existed. Tanner dismantled it, and built a two-story 22 room hotel. In 1874 he sold to McClelland and Byers for $3,500. His next venture was a general store at Milford, and then had a brief stint as a innkeeper of the Milford Hotel. In 1878, Tanner relocated to Ukiah where he operated another hotel until his passing in 1898.

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