There have been several comments posted last year, that a short sentence would not suffice, so I will slowly start responding. One reader wanted to know the status of Eagle Lake’s Gallatin House. Malvena Gallatin spent the Christmas of 1944 there and it would be her last visit. When she passed away in 1956, she left the two-acre parcel to her only great-grandchild, Wyn Wachhorst. When Wyn visited the place once in the 1960s the “Gallatin furniture was piled high inside,” but no one ever used it. In 1975, it was sold to the Lassen National Forest.

In the mid-1980s, Lassen National Forest Supervisor Dick Henry wanted to demolish the structure. Needless to say the battle line was drawn. The late Valerie Campbell and myself began a campaign to save Gallatin House. I will spare everyone the details, but in the end we along with so many others who fought to preserve prevailed. In 1988, the forest service issued a use permit to thirty-five acres, which includes Gallatin House for Camp Ronald McDonald at Eagle Lake. The Gallatin House has been maintained and used for administration purposes and two front rooms are intact just as it was back in the day when Gallatin’s owned it.

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