Thought I would pass along the above stock certificate. During the early 1900s numerous local businesses and organizations incorporated. By doing so it allowed them to sale stock, as an avenue to raise funds.
Hopefully, in about a month’s time I will have the history of the Susanville Country Club ready to be put on line.
In 1906, Brashear Street became the first new street inside the original town plat. There would be only three other streets inside the original city limits to be created. There is something the reader can contemplate which were the others.
William Brashear owned all of Block 32 and segments of Blocks 24 and 31. These had never subdivided into lots. With the pending arrival of the railroad, that all changed. It was prime residential property, as it provided some of the best views of the area. In 1911, J.W. Scott, a realtor subdivided the lots on the east side of Gay Street around to Brashear. It became one of the town’s first upscale developments. The initial deed restriction required all houses built cost at least $1,000.
Susanville’s first catholic organization the Knights of Columbus was formed in the same year as the Susanville Elk’s Lodge and the Susanville Country Club. It was busy period in the town’s history. Continue reading Susanville – Knights of Columbus
On August 7, 1934 during a special session of the Susanville City Council they condemned the Liberty Theater, after state inspectors stated it was unsafe. Two day’s later the theater would close, and it was only fitting the film shown that day was “The Party’s Over.” It should be noted that the Liberty was built in 1921 and in 1924 it was purchased by T & D Enterprises.
In late September, demolition began on the Liberty Theater and it was announced a new theater would be built on the site of the old one, to be named Sierra Theater. Construction on the concrete re-inforced theater began in October, and the owners noted it was earthquake proof, the first of its kind in Susanville. On Friday, March 8, 1935 a grand opening was held for $75,000 theater. The first showing was appropriately a film named, “The Whole Town’s Talking.”
After World War I, a new sport captured the nation and Lassen County got swept up in that craze. Golf. It was A.G. Breitwieser of the Lassen Lumber & Box Company, C.W. Hallowell of the local hardware store and James Christie of the furniture store that became the main instigators.
In the spring of 1924 they negotiated a lease with S.D. Ridenour for a portion of his ranch three miles south of Susanville for a 9-hole golf course. In a short time, their group became formerly known as the Susanville Country Club.
On May 11, 1924, the golf course was opened, hours sunrise to sunset. The fee 75 cents a day.
Shirley’s was a bar on the north end of Hall Street, the current site of the Juniper Apartments. Established in the 1930s after the repeal of prohibition, by Jean “Shirley” Tilton, and its distance from town on a road heading to points northward was similar to the roadhouses between Susanville and Westwood. *
It was quite the interesting watering hole, “Shirley” a former nurse, was confined to a wheel chair, but remembered for her generosity. She was also a madam, and cabins behind her establishment took care of certain needs of her clientele. Then there was her friend, gay piano man, and member of Sacred Heart Church’s choir, that assisted her, until he committed suicide in 1938. When she died in 1954, Gene Garayoa and Steve Arainty transformed it into the Juniper Inn.
*Ash Street, was not in existence.
On February 18, 1928 the Lassen High Block L Society formed, that was the boy’s athletic organization. One of their first activities was the painting of the “L” on Susanville Peak. In 2008, Betty Jo Buckles Coplen provided me with this behind the scene account: “In 1924, my father, Maynard Robert “Billy” Buckles accepted a position teaching at Lassen Union High School, and we moved to Susanville. Four years later, members of the new Block L Society came to my Dad. They asked him to help them plan a Block L for them to lay out on the hillside. He helped them to design a letter L with the proper classic proportions (200 yards long). He also warned them that a letter of that size would be difficult to keep whitewashed. The Block L boys persevered and constructed the letter on the hill, moving rocks into the outline to be painted white. For decades as planned the freshman boys painted the letter each year, but eventually that practice died out.”
While the Block L Society no longer exists, the Lassen High Alumni Association has from time to time maintained it, the last time was done in 2008.
Located at 609 North Street, Susanville is the stately Roseberry House constructed in 1903 and is the community’s only bed and breakfast operation. However, a hundred years earlier, its owner then, also took in tourists.
The house was constructed for Thomas and Viola Roseberry. When Lassen Peak came alive as a real live volcano in 1914, area residents flocked to the mountain to take a look first hand. For Thomas Roseberry it was a fatal mistake for in August 1915, while climbing down the peak he died from a heart attack. Another tragic event occurred earlier in the month when the Emerson Hotel, located only two blocks from the Roseberry home was destroyed by fire.
These circumstances forced Viola into action. She made some remodeling changes to her home and began to take in travelers and boarders alike, which she would do so for another decade.
When the Sacred Heart Parish was established in 1912, it had a church, but it did not provide housing for a priest. When Father O’Reilly arrived to take care of the pastoral duties, he boarded initially at the Emerson Hotel. When that hotel was destroyed by fire, he purchased a small cottage.
In October 1922, Father Patrick J. McCarthy became O’Reilly’s successor. McCarthy spent his first three weeks sleeping in the organ loft of the church. It turned out to be unseasonably cold, and as many an old time parishioner recalled that church was cold and drafty. As a result McCarthy came down with pneumonia, and required hospitalization. Once discharged from the hospital efforts were underway to build a rectory next to the church. Within in a month’s time it was completed with lumber donated by Fruit Growers and Lassen Lumber and parishioners volunteered to construct it.
William Samuel Brashear arrived in Lassen County in an unexpected way. In 1863, he helped fellow Southerner John M. Kelley retain his original land claim of 1200 acres. When the U.S. Government surveyed the Honey Lake Valley, one could only file claim to 160-acres. Thus, nucleus of southern sympathizers claimed property around Kelley and the region became known as the Tule Confederacy. Continue reading William S. Brashear