NORTHERN CALIFORNIA BEFORE THE GOLD RUSH

Unfortunately, what little is known about the indigenous populations of the Yuba-Bear River watersheds prior to the Gold Rush is limited to what can be learned from the analysis of stone tools – that’s not nearly enough to reflect the complexity and vitality of the people who were here first.  Landscapes and resource patches managed by the Nisenan and Washoe were generally large enough to permit native populations to gather and harvest resources as a group.  Usually such bulk harvesting required people to travel from their major villages to specific clusters of resources to collect large quantities of nuts, seeds, fruits, bulbs, roots, leaves, or stalks for basketry.  This was not drudgery because it also offered opportunities for trade and social contact with neighboring groups.  There is also the epicurian pleasure of camping near a meadow where favorite foods like yampa, wild plums or blackberries were abundant.  Some foods, like acorns and sugar pine nuts, were transported back to winter villages where they could be stored.

Before the demographic wave of the gold rush, aboriginal trade and travel was possible because of what the late anthropologist Warren d’Azevedo called “corridors of tolerated access.”  The corridor concept makes an important distinction between travel and trespass (d’Azevedo worked with the Washoe for over fifty years and founded the Anthropology Department at the University of Nevada, Reno).  The Washoe were located at a nexus of trade routes.  Among their trade routes: they traded eastward with the Paiute of the Great Basin, northerly with the people of the Columbia Plateau, westerly with the Nisenan of the Sierra Nevada foothills and Sacramento Valley and to the south and southeast with the Miwok, Mono Lake Paiute and Shoshone.

Spanish Explorers

ENTRADA

Explorers flatter themselves by positing that they are on the frontier and on unknown lands, but in reality, they are often in the homelands of people who have lived in a particular place for centuries, or thousands of years.  The indigenous people lived in the center of their world and didn’t see themselves at the edge of someone else’s.

Between 1769 and 1823, twenty-one missions were built by the Spanish.  You might assume that the indigenous people of the San Joaquin and Sacramento Valleys and the people in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada wouldn’t have been affected by the missions, but this was not the case.  Even though Spaniards seldom explored the interior their animals, plants and microbes escaped and spread inland.  That didn’t go unnoticed by the native peoples who were very aware of the biosphere.  Central Valley people were eating horses, cattle and new and unusual plants before they ever saw a white man.

While they generally stayed close to the coast, Spanish explorers ventured inland in the early 19^th century.  Gabriel Moraga traveled overland to the Sacramento Valley in 1806 and again in 1808.  He was followed by the expeditions of Luis Arguello who, in 1817 and again in 1821, sailed far enough up the Feather River to see “Los Picachos” or “Tres Picos”, later named the Sutter Buttes.  During their adventures they inadvertently introduced new plants, animals and diseases into the ecosystem.  The indigenous people of the valley and foothills had a strong dependence on grass seeds and surely noticed the rapidly changing grasslands.

THE MISSIONS

A mission was more than a church; it was also an agricultural pueblo with hundreds, or even thousands, of Indians lured there with presents and kept there by soldiers.  At first, the Indians were fascinated by the new and unusual trade goods and attentive to the new stories the Padres told, but they soon found themselves captives who were forced to abandon their traditional lifeways.  Missions were seen as a way to pacify and convert the Indians and to include them, at the lowest level, into the encomienda system.  The encomienda was simply a variation of the European feudal-manorial system.  Once ensnared in this humiliating system they also experienced harsh treatment prompting many to attempt escape.  Those who successfully made it to the San Joaquin Valley and Sierra Nevada foothills taught the Yokuts and Miwok to ride horses.

LIVESTOCK RAIDING

Even in the 18th century outlying “heathens” were running off livestock and reminding the mission inhabitants that they were vulnerable.  In time inland Indians realized that, with proper techniques, horse and cattle raiding was fairly easy and it thoroughly irritated the white men.  The continual acquisition of horses made them more mobile and efficient as trade opportunities continually increased until 1835, when stock raiding was widespread.  Within two generations the Yokuts and Miwok showed that they could adapt from a semi-sedentary plant-based people to nomadic, meat-eating cavalrymen.  Had it not been for the aggressive Indian-hating Americans arriving in the 1840s and provoking a war with Mexico they may have been able to drive out the invaders from the coast.

Indian Horseman in the Northern San Joaquin Valley

Charles Koppel 1854

As early as 1800 the Snake, Cayuse, Walla-Walla and others from the Columbian Plateau were trading in California for horses, Mexican blankets, vermillion and manufactured goods.  When Yellow Bird from the Columbia River area led a trading expedition of 40 Nez Perce, Cayuse, and Walla Walla to Sutter’s Fort in California's Sacramento Valley in 1844 to trade for livestock he remembered that he was there on horse raids with his family about 1800.  Among the major meeting places for trading were Yainax in southern Oregon, the Columbia River Plateau and the Humboldt Sink.  By 1820, Surprise Valley, in northeastern California, had become a well-traveled section of a major north-south highway passing along the east face of the Cascade and Sierra Nevada Ranges. This highway was heavily traversed by emergent predatory bands of horsemen. 

Yellow Serpent

On the west side of the Sierra Nevada punitive raids by the colonial authorities became more common and pushed the horse-raiding California Indians into the foothills.  The establishment of the horse-nomad pattern in east central California and western Nevada was a major and significant re-adaptive shift.  Horse raiding flourished between 1833 and 1846.

What were mounted Indians from California and Idaho doing at the Humboldt Sink, Paiute territory, in 1829?  It was its location as a central place on a river highway linking California with the Rockies and it was the only place with enough water and grass to support large numbers of horses.  The Humboldt Sink was a site that could support the emerging predatory bands of the western Great Basin, with California and Idaho horsemen.  Major commodities at the Humboldt rendezvous were probably horses and manufactured goods from California.  On a least one occasion the California Indians brought salmon.

Rather than a frozen ethnographic present, the pattern that emerges is one of vitality and change during the protohistoric period characterized by relocations and adaptations of people on the northern and eastern peripheries of California.  Encounters with these groups, were fortuitously recorded in the journals of Peter Ogden and Jedediah Smith.  A peak seems to have been reached in 1846, when the Americans were struggling for power in California; after that there was a decline.

The Nisenan, too, may have become engaged in the horse and livestock trafficking were it not for the devastating epidemics of the 1830s followed by Sutter’s heavy-handed intimidation of the Nisenan.

MEXICAN CALIFORNIA – THE CALIFORNIOS

In 1821 Mexico gained its Independence but Alta California was considered a remote and undesirable outpost to most ambitious Mexicans.  Most of today’s depictions of the rancho period are somewhat over-glamourized but there’s no denying they were excellent vaqueros.  Both men and women of this era were proficient equestrians and gracious hosts who held splendid social gatherings with feasting, dancing, singing and displays of horsemanship and other skills associated with ranching.

When Hawaiian King Kamehameha I was gifted some cattle by English navigator George Vancouver in 1792 he protected them until they wreaked havoc on gardens and could not be restrained.  The king sent a special envoy to Alta California to hire vaqueros to manage the cattle and to teach his own men about ranching and the specific skills needed.  The ensuing generations of Hawaiian cowboys, still working, are called Paniolos.  Among the original vaqueros were Joaquin Armas, Miguel Castro, and Frederico Ramon Baesa whose legacy endures with Paniolos inheriting a taste for braided lariats, adorned saddles, bright ponchos, long spurs, bandanas, and floppy wide-brimmed hats.  The flair and fashion of Californio clothing and gear is an audacious blend of Spanish and Indian design where form and function merge beautifully.  In my research I often come across comments from Americans of that era who criticize the expressiveness of Californio culture – do I detect a hint of envy?

Californio

Foreign trade was allowed when Mexico gained independence but hides and tallow were the only exports – for a good depiction of that era I recommend reading Richard Henry Dana’s, “Two Years Before the Mast.” In north central California Europeans wanted large tracts of land that could be turned to agriculture and ranching using local Indians as a workforce.  Among those who obtained Mexican Land Grants in the lower regions of the Feather, Bear and Yuba Rivers were William Johnson, John Rose, Theodor Cordua, Theodore Sicard, Claude Chana and John Sutter who received Mexican citizenship, a grant of 11,000 square leagues (49,000 acres) and a position as regional official.  The lingua franca in Alta California at the time was Spanish and most Indians, who were typically multilingual, spoke at least enough to conduct trade.

Map of Mexican Land Grants

TRAPPING / HUNTING

Meanwhile the Russians, British and Bostonians were voraciously trapping sea otter, and to a lesser degree northern fur seal, off the California coast until they were seriously depleted.  Bostonians were trading with China, where a sea otter pelt, typically measuring 5 feet by 2 feet, was worth $300.  The Russians, in addition to furs, also gathered and traded geese and duck down.

Trapper

Beaver trapping opened the interior of California.  American Jedidiah Strong Smith and Michael Framboise of the Hudson’s Bay Company were trapping fur-bearing mammals in the Sacramento Valley as early as 1826.  Smith and his trappers represented the United States’ fur interests giving Alta California even more of an international presence.  He also introduced American fur and horse traders from the southwest, mostly independent mountain men and Indians collectively known as chaquanosos (adventurers of all nations) who came from as far away as New Mexico and Colorado.

John Work, in 1833, led the Southern Trapping Party of the Hudson’s Bay Company that included 63 people and 400 horses.  They camped in what is now known as the Sutter Buttes just north of today’s Yuba City.  His diary entry of February 22 is witness to their wanton killing of wildlife: “There is excellent feeding for the horses, and abundance of animals for the people to subsist on. 395 elk, 148 deer, 17 bears, and 8 antelopes have been killed in a month, which is certainly a great many more than was required.”  Most of the Indian employees of the company were fugitives from the missions, while other Indian people came from the Columbia Plateau, and the San Joaquin Valley of Alta California, Aleuts came from the far north and Kanakas came from Hawaii and New Zealand.  Trapping caused a rapid reduction in fur-bearing mammals while the Anglo trappers themselves introduced disease for which the indigenous people had no immunity.

One more thing, engagement in the trapping economy also made the Indians dependent on it.  While trapping they neglected traditional practices like burning and various horticultural practices that were sustainable.  Also, when the beaver were depleted the white trappers simply moved on leaving the natives with diminished resources.

THE EPIDEMICS OF THE 1830s

Trappers from the Columbian Plateau inadvertently brought malaria, followed by measles to the Sacramento Valley in 1833, with smallpox arriving in 1837.  In less than a decade these diseases wiped out an estimated 75% of the valley Nisenan.  Disease extended from the upper Sacramento Valley, south to the King’s River and east to the bordering foothills.  Sexually transmitted diseases, introduced by the Spanish, were also commonplace with syphilis affecting 20% of the native population.

Derby's 1849 Map of the Sacramento Valley

Here is an eye-witness account of the epidemic by J.J. Warner, “From the head of the Sacramento to the great bend and slough of the San Joaquin we did not see more than six or eight live Indians; while large numbers of their skulls and dead bodies were seen under almost every shade tree near the water, where the uninhabited and deserted villages had been converted into graveyards.”  Many of the surviving Indians fled to the foothills where refugees presented new circumstances for their hosts such as an increased demand on resources, new ideas and charismatic leaders who emerged in the midst of ongoing crises.

Biologist and ethno-historian, Sherburne Cook, demonstrated that disease and hostility were the major causes of aboriginal population decline, closely followed by malnourishment and starvation.  Former native habitat was fenced, with springs and meadows now off-limits. Streams were full of siltation and riparian habitat was destroyed.  To eat well and enjoy the essential rhythm of Nisenan lifeways it takes seasonal access to hunt and gather in three ecosystems.  Instead, the Nisenan found themselves competing with introduced livestock for food and fenced out of areas with springs and meadows.  Naturally a starving person, family or band of people will steal a cow, pig or chicken, but when caught they were severely punished.  When “chastising” the Indians it was a common practice to destroy stored foods and the implements used to produce food.

JOHN SUTTER

In northern California Sutter’s name is all over the place: there is Sutter’s Fort, Sutter Creek, Sutter County, the Sutter National Wildlife Refuge, Sutter Health, Sutterville Elementary School and Sutter Middle School, to name but a few.  There is also a small but spectacular island of mountains, north of today’s Yuba City, called Sutter Buttes.  Shelly Covert, spokesperson for the Nisenan Nevada City Rancheria, remembers her grandfather telling her it is impolite to refer to these mountains, known as Histum Yani to the Nisenan, by using Sutter’s name.

Mission fugitives were moving upstream on the Sacramento river about the time that Sutter arrived.  Sutter, his eight Kanaka laborers, and a handful of white settlers reached the juncture of the American and Sacramento Rivers in August of 1839.  At first, he told the Miwok, Nisenan and other Indians that he came in peace and he offered them employment.  Later, he showed the Indians the three cannons he had, thus warning the Indians that he would not hesitate to use force if necessary.

Sutter's Fort

Gleason' Drawing Room Companion

It was in Sutter’s best interests to stop livestock raiding.  To protect New Helvetia he put together a force of 150 Indian infantrymen and 50 cavalrymen supervised by a few whites.  They wore blue and green uniforms with red trim bought from the Russians at Fort Ross in 1841.  This must have been an intimidating (or bewildering) sight.

Sutter was all about business.  He hoped to profit from every settler who ventured into the region, and he did all he could to welcome newcomers.  It’s not far-fetched to compare Sutter’s fort with Ellis Island – he even issued passports to newcomers much to the chagrin of Governor Alvarado.  Sutter played a pivotal role in opening California for American settlement.  Sutter's story combines myth with reality and reminds us that settlement in California was often based on corruption, lies and luck.

Sutter treated “his Indians” as slaves and managed them with favors and punishment, including whippings and murder.  He used bells to teach punctuality and introduce new work rhythms and tried to teach the Indians the value of monogamy and the tenants of patriarchy.  Sutter routinely engaged in human trafficking, he kept a harem of Indian girls and even gave Indian girls to his white trading partners.  Sutter saw himself as king and did as he liked.  In his Reminisciences (1876), he reaffirms this by proclaiming, “I, Sutter, am the law!”  Furthermore, “The Indians I did not marry or bury I was everything [to]: patriarch, priest, father and judge.”  This is not hyperbole – it’s all in the historical record.

Sketch of a Nisenan Settlement near Yuba City (Sutter's Hock Farm)

The drying cotton shirts cost the Indian workers two-weeks labor per shirt.

When gold was discovered at a sawmill on Sutter’s land grant, most of his workers deserted and the Americans he so admired swarmed his land with total disregard for Sutter’s kingdom.

AMERICAN SETTLERS

In 1840 there were approximately 400, mostly American, emigrants in California.  The overland Bidwell-Bartleson Party arrived in 1841 and in 1844 the Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party were the first wagons to cross the summit at what would later be named Donner Pass.  The ill-fated Donner Party attempted a crossing of the summit in 1846.

For the most part they came as families.  They were American citizens who aimed to stay that way, as proud Protestants they weren’t about to convert to Catholicism.  Americans were less pastoral than Californios and were more interested in retail sales.  To top it all off they disliked Californios and found miscegenation repugnant.  President Polk, in 1844, proclaimed that the move westward was America’s manifest destiny, that is to say, that their takeover was ordained by (their) god.  Frustrated by Californio corruption and innately impatient they declared the California Republic in Monterrey in 1846.  In the same year war was declared on Mexico.

GOLD

In 1848, only nine days after gold was discovered on the American River the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed and Mexico surrendered Alta California to the Americans.  Jonas Spect, led by an Indian guide, discovered gold on the Yuba River at Rose Bar on June 2, 1848.  Within a year traditional Nisenan territory was overrun by rude strangers.

The Spaniards and Mexicans had a place for the indigenous people in their economic and social order, but the Americans did not.  The American solution to the “Indian problem” was to establish a permanent farming population.  After the gold rush was over the labor market was flooded with whites leaving only domestic work and subsistence labor available to the Indians.

Before the gold rush, the foothill Nisenan were absorbing refugees from the missions – terrified and shocked people fleeing malaria, measles, cholera, kidnapping and violence.  This disarray resulted in readjustments of territories, alliances, constituencies, political structures and traditional practices.  A few leaders appeared but futile attempts at resistance showed them that they were hopelessly outnumbered.

In 1848 the local Indians were willing to help the people obsessed with gold in exchange for exotic trade goods like beads, cloth, tools, sugar and alcohol.  In 1848 and early 1849 they were laborers on mining claims where they constituted half of the gold miners in California.  But in 1849 they mined for themselves while some whites set up trading posts for their trade.  Among them were Bovyer’s, Empire Ranch, Jones Bar, White Oak Springs, Storms Ranch and Findley’s.  In 1850 California became a state and the Indians were no longer allowed to mine, but they continued to supplement their subsistence by sniping for gold.

This brief synopsis of a dynamic half century is barely adequate but hopefully introduces some people to a seldom addressed era before the gold rush.  History is complex and there are always versions of what happened.  But history is no one version.  As the late Ursula LeGuin put it, “… stories co-exist as facets of an agreed upon truth, a composite of points of view.”

• • •

THE STEVENS TRAIL / NORTH FORK OF THE AMERICAN RIVER

Looking Downstream to Mineral Bar

My intent with this blog is to write about the Yuba and Bear Rivers in the Sierra Nevada in California, but there are other beautiful, interesting and exhilarating rivers nearby.  The North Fork of the American is a designated Wild and Scenic River and the Stevens Trail is on the National Register of Historic Places.  The trail is in a steep and rugged canyon located only a few miles south of the Bear River and I visit it often because it’s in the neighborhood.

Be forewarned that the Stevens Trail has become extremely popular and can be very busy in good weather.  Part of its popularity is because the trailhead is on a major highway and therefore easy to get to, also in the spring the hillsides are ablaze with colorful wildflowers.  The trail is a 3.7 mile descent of 1,200’ from the trailhead to its terminus at Secret Canyon followed by a return walk back upslope to the trailhead making it a 7.4-mile hike.  It’s a well-designed 19^th century pack trail that’s doable by a wide spectrum of hikers, even those who seldom hike.

I generally avoid crowds, so I seldom use this trail in pleasant weather unless I leave early in the morning or hike in the winter when it’s just as gorgeous.  Because of the heavy use it’s important that you leave no trace and pack out trash left.  This trail is a gift and deserves respect.

How to get there:

Colfax, California is on Interstate Highway 80 between Auburn and Emigrant Gap.  Take the Colfax Exit and get on North Canyon Way on the east side of the highway.  Drive north for less than a mile, past the cemetery, to the clearly marked trailhead.  Some people have homes adjacent to the trailhead so don’t block driveways or trespass – be neighborly.

The Stevens Trail

The Stevens Trail connected the supply and transportation hub of Illinoistown with the hydraulic mining town of Iowa Hill and other mines on various tributaries.  In between these two settlements is the North Fork of the American River located at the bottom of a steep canyon.  The ridge dividing the Bear River and the North Fork of the American climbs northeasterly from Auburn to Illinoistown.  Illinoistown was located about a mile south of present-day Colfax and was also known as Upper Corral and Alder Grove.  The Placer Herald of September 18, 1852 said that it was named Illinoistown in October of 1849 when the miners had a grand dinner in this “town of four houses”, and since most of them were Illinoisans, “… they by acclimation and a bottle of whiskey, named the place Illinoistown.”  The same article describes two productive steam operated sawmills and a fruit orchard – by 1853 they also had a Post Office.

The earliest references to Illinoistown describe it as lying within a small valley which, of course, was valuable to the indigenous Nisenan people as well.  This valley, and others like it were within forests of Sugar Pine, Douglas Fir, Incense Cedar, Yellow Pine and Black Oak providing a mosaic of diverse ecosystems and environmental nooks that were essential ingredients for the Nisenan version of the good life.

The industrious inhabitants of Illinoistown immediately went to work dropping trees, digging holes for gold, creating big corrals and allowing livestock and horses in streams and meadows and other native ecosystems.  Despite this rude behavior the Nisenan people were never consulted.  The interlopers never asked for permission, never offered a trade, never even had a meeting to disclose their intent.  They simply ignored the indigenous people.  When the Nisenan responded by nicking cattle and horses the whites retaliated with extreme measures, eventually burning the native's winter stores in several locations and forming a militia called the California Blades, who burned entire indigenous settlements and posted Indian scalps along the trail between Auburn and Illinoistown.  This particular episode of barbaric behavior is well documented in the historic record.

Secret Canyon and the North Fork of the American

The ridge itself is still a major route from the Sacramento Valley and Auburn to Donner Summit and the east side of the Sierra Nevada.  There was trade and communication between the west-side Nisenan and the east-side Washoe for centuries and there is archaeological evidence of trade and occupation for thousands of years by the unnamed people who preceded them.  In the historic era, Illinoistown was the eastern terminus of navigation for wagon traffic, a place where goods and people were transferred to pack animals who descended into the canyons to supply miners on the Bear River and the North Fork of the American and its tributaries. The trail between Illinoistown and Iowa Hill was built in anticipation of the transcontinental railroad (Central Pacific Railroad) which was completed in 1869.

John Rutherford allegedly began work on the trail in 1867 and immediately took on a partner named Truman Stevens who, by 1870, was the sole owner of the trail.  Prior to the railroad there were already rudimentary trails into the canyons used by both the indigenous people and gold miners, but the Stevens Trail was an investment.  In 1866 a Post Office was opened in Colfax, while the one in Illinoistown was closed.

Iowa Hill is 9 air-miles southeast of Colfax on a ridge between the North Fork of the American and Indian Creek at an elevation of 2,860’.  Gold was discovered near Iowa Hill in 1848 but the area was propelled into prominence by the discovery of deep gravels in 1854.  These tertiary gravels were mined by hydraulicking and later by drift mining.  In its heyday there were 15 stores and 18 hotels with a population of approximately 1,000.  By 1880 the Iowa Hill mining district had produced $20 million in gold but was considered “worked out.”

Slaughter Ravine

As you begin your descent from the trailhead there is mostly Canyon Live Oak above and below the trail.  In the wet months the tread can get a bit soggy.  Where the trail crosses Slaughter Ravine there are wildflowers in the spring and summer along with introduced plants like Tree of Heaven, Periwinkle and fruit trees.  Before long you’ll find yourself on a dirt road that was created in 1978 and remains the only disturbance to an otherwise pristine trail.  Easy to find signs will direct you back to the trail.

At Robbers Ravine the trail splits into an upper trail and lower trail.  The upper trail is the more scenic of the two, but it can be difficult to navigate in the wet season.  From the upper trail is a good view of Cape Horn where Chinese laborers, while secured by ropes, picked and blasted a ledge for the Central Pacific Railroad tracks.  Cape Horn is a steep bluff with a 75° slope, 1,400’ above the North Fork of the American River.  There is a popular story about Chinese workers in baskets hanging over a cliff to do this work, but this can’t be substantiated by research and this geologic feature is not really a cliff, but a dome with a dramatic slope.  Baskets would shred if they were lowered and raised along this rocky slide.  Author Maxine Hong Kingston tells a story about a man, who supposedly worked on this project, describing the lowering of baskets to get Chinese workers in position to set dynamite.  I doubt its accuracy as history simply because there are no records. Also, reminiscences, in their continuous retelling, change and tend to amplify the “good parts.”  Maxine Hong Kingston is a contemporary artist informed by tradition, who freely admits that some of her work is outside of the sphere of academia and wouldn’t necessarily stand up to Western critical analysis but this does not diminish her art in any way.  There is an interesting discussion of this topic on the Central Pacific Railroad site (cprr.org).

Facing Cape Horn From Robbers Ravine

After the two trails merge, you’ll come to a place where the trail becomes a rock ledge with a mining excavation adjacent to the trail.  Don’t bother exploring, it wouldn’t be an abandoned mine if it were productive.  Continue walking out to a point with a great view of the North Fork of the American downstream where you can see the bridge at Mineral Bar.  In 1851 a ferry crossed the river here on the wagon road between Illinoistown and Iowa Hill.  Charles Rice built the Mineral Bar and Iowa City Turnpike Road in 1854 and worked as the superintendent and toll collector for the next 30 years.  Tolls across the 110’ bridge ranged from 25 cents for a pedestrian to $6.50 for six yoke of oxen and a wagon.  It was a 10-mile trip that took four hours.  Placer County purchased the road in 1906 and today Mineral Bar is a Bureau of Land Management managed recreation area.

From this expansive vista the Stevens Trail descends to the east, with curvy river views and some steep drops downslope.  On September 4, 1884 the Placer Argus published an article titled “Fatal Fall” in which they report the arrival of a riderless horse in Iowa Hill prompting the formation of a search party.  “Honorable J. H. Neff found a hat known to belong to E. Webster on the Stevens Trail about a mile from the river on the Colfax side.  Mr. Webster was about 60 years old and a native of Maine.  His body was found well below the trail.  It is supposed that his hat fell off, and he dismounted and stumbled over the bank, a distance of over 200 feet.”  In November of 1890 the same newspaper reported the shooting of a 7’ long, 125-pound mountain lion on the Stevens Trail.  The message is the usual one for outdoor activities, enjoy yourself but remain alert, for things can change in an instant.

Hikers on the Stevens Trail

There are long shade-free areas as you descend to Secret Canyon so wear a hat, use sunscreen and bring enough water.  It can get hot here in mid-summer.  When you get close to the river at Secret Canyon, there is a rocky ledge below the trail with a few bedrock mortars and some rusted wire rope.  This was the location of a wire rope suspension bridge across the river that was used extensively from 1871 to 1895; in 1914 it collapsed and was never rebuilt.  Andrew Hallidie, renowned for his invention of the San Francisco cable cars, made the first wire rope produced in the West for the Bay State Mine on the Middle Fork of the American River in 1856.  In the following year Hallide established a plant to produce wire rope in San Francisco’s North Beach.  By 1869 A.S. Hallidie & Company had built a 320’ bridge across Deer Creek in Nevada City and a 225’ bridge across the Bear River, among others.  Years ago I walked the trail from Iowa Hill to this place and it was dense with vegetation and less scenic than the north side but I can’t vouch for its condition now.

Wire Rope from the Suspension Bridge that Crossed the River (1870-1914)

In addition to the bedrock mortars found at the bridge site here there are many more on the river’s edge just above the stream in Secret Canyon.  In the early 1980s we counted over 50 bedrock mortars at this location.  In the intervening 40 years many of the mortars have filled with sand and gravel due to the accumulation of silt and the periodic placer mining that takes place here.  This is such a beautiful spot.  Imagine the Nisenan gathered here where the river is shallow and there is a gravely bottom, perfect for salmon spawning.  The men may have been fishing here, while the women were possibly drying salmon and pounding fish bones into a powder suitable for soup stock, while caring for the children swimming nearby.  I don't think I'm reaching to say that they enjoyed and appreciated this place and I can easily imagine them singing, swapping stories and sharing jokes as they worked.  This is obviously a seasonal campsite and I wonder what trail they used to get here.

Bedrock Mortars Alongside the North Fork of the American

When you get out of the canyon you may be hungry and ready for some regional hippie-mex food available at Homie Joe’s Tacos on North Canyon Road a stone’s throw from the Colfax Cemetery, near Highway 80’s Exit 135.  There are some trade offs, but there is a unique and savory menu, plenty to eat, and great ambiance.  I appreciated being addressed as “Brother-Man” and I intend to return.

Hank Meals will be hiking the Stevens Trail on January 12, 2020, For more information contact laura@hiking4good.com.

• • •

CANYON CREEK TRAIL ON THE NORTH YUBA RIVER

Bedrock mortars at Cut Eye Fosters Bar

[It just dawned on me that I talked about this trail in an earlier post (Indian Valley/September 2018) but, just like I’ve walked this trail many times, what harm is there in writing about it more than once?  Compare the two posts for different renditions].

How to get there:  From Nevada City, California travel north for 30 miles on State Highway 49 to the bridge over the North Yuba River and make an immediate left to the trailhead parking area.  On the way there you will cross the South Yuba and the Middle Yuba Rivers.

The Canyon Creek Trail is a pleasant all-seasons trail that parallels the North Yuba River on a sidehill trail through a lush forest at about 2,300 feet in elevation.  Along the way there are many places to find solitude and/or splendid swimming holes.  The walk to Shenanigan Flat is a bit over a mile, it’s about 2 miles to Cherokee Creek and about 3 ½ miles to Canyon Creek.  The trail begins on a gated road just after crossing the Highway 49 bridge over the North Yuba River.  In the late 1960s this dirt road transported campers to Shenanigan Flat where the Forest Service maintained a campground, but has since closed it.  The road itself was created in the 1860s, probably just after the big flood in the winter of 1862 when all of the bridges on the Yuba River were swept away.

As you hike take notice of the rock retaining walls on the downslope side of the road.  Of course, the real attention getter is the North Yuba – it’s beauty, speed and, in the wetter months, it’s sound.  This whole stretch of the river, from Indian Valley down to the mouth of Canyon Creek is inaccessible by vehicle and idyllic to visit for a swim, an ousel’s song or for pure wanderment.  There are few trails to the river from the main trail but much of it is approachable.  I urge you to respect this, and all rivers, you’re just visiting.

  Near Shenanigan Flat

The river makes a noticeable turn to the northwest at a place called Shenanigan Flat, a wonderful name whose origins are lost to the void of history.  I did find a few basalt flakes left behind by a stone age tool maker but the earliest historical presence I could find was a record of the mining claim of Michael Cortes & Company in 1874.  It’s a relatively flat bench sitting above the river, opposite Indian Creek, and must have made a sweet summer camp site for centuries before gold miners arrived.  There is an active, but low-key, mining claim nearby and there are the remains of concrete fire pits left from its days as a campground.

I have a friend who lived for a summer at the Shenanigan Flat campground in the late 1960s.  He was there with his family trying “to get back to the land.”  In hippie dialect that meant they had “dropped out” and were poor, but proud of it.  Their neighbors in the campground were a family who were trying to make some money by small-scale gold mining – they didn’t dress, act or talk like hippies.  Both families were polite to each other but not real friendly.  Their kids sometimes played together, but it was casual. 

The other neighbor worth noting was a large rattlesnake “seen around camp fairly often.”  My friend and his family were “OK with the snake” because it hadn’t displayed any territoriality.  In fact, they were almost in a state of grace because they lived near danger by being alert and harmonious with nature.  In other words, no one had been threatened or bitten.  Everyone was aware that the snake was there because it was acknowledged in manly conversations consisting of short sentences and grunts.

In time the mining family had gotten used to their natural neighbors and invited then to dinner around the campfire.  This blatant hospitality couldn’t be ignored, and the hippie family was determined to be a good neighbor, even if they were served Spam and canned string beans.  Instead, it was a big surprise when their host started frying a rattlesnake, while offering that it was “the big one.”  When faced with a spiritual conundrum it’s best to accept the hospitality, which the hippie family did.  I’m sure this qualifies as a shenanigan.

As the trail proceeds downstream to the northwest it assumes the width of the earlier wagon road that still extends to Cherokee Creek where there was once a toll bridge across the North Yuba.  The two historical maps that show the bridge location differ – the topography suggests that the bridge was on the east (upstream) side of Cherokee Creek.  On the opposite ridgetop, a few miles north of Camptonville, was a place called Depot Hill which was the highest and easternmost extent of freight wagon navigation in 1850.  Here wagons were downloaded to pack animals for the steep descent to Cherokee Creek and Cut Eye Fosters Bar on the North Yuba where there was another pack trail coming upstream from Fosters Bar (no relation to Cut Eye), which is now under water behind New Bullards Bar Dam.  At this point you’re probably annoyed that I’m not using possessive apostrophes when describing historic mining locations.  That’s because it’s a local convention not to – they were never used on maps, in contemporary newspaper accounts, mining journals or even Post Offices – I’m only perpetuating a local custom.

Near Cut Eye Fosters Bar

While mining at Cut Eye Fosters Bar in the summer of 1849 Philo Haven was approached by an Indian named Lo who offered to trade gold nuggets for some exotic miner’s cuisine.  Farris and Smith’s, 1882 History of Sierra County described the occasion this way: “Mr Haven began frying pancakes. The company began having visions of a famine. Even the great American pie-eater would have hung his head in shame had he beheld the delicate mouthfuls and the quantity of food devoured on this occasion. But even an Indian’s capacity was limited, and the feast was finally finished, greatly to the relief of the gold hunters.”  The next day they headed upstream to a place that would eventually become Downieville only to find that Hedgepath & Company had staked out claims already but there was plenty of good mining ground left.  

Cut Eye Fosters Bar was the most upstream place to obtain provisions on the North Yuba in 1850.  Newton Miller and company used a wing-dam to mine here from January 1851 to July 1852 and called it “a lively place.”  Cut-Eye Foster was described as a professional horse thief who employed Indians and kept a corral of pack animals.  California historian, T. H. Hittell remarked, that Foster had no problems with the local Indians because he had no prejudice against them.  “Judging by his own experience, he did not think there was any danger to be anticipated as long as they were not molested.”  William Downie had dealings with Cut Eye Foster and said he was philanthropic, but dishonest, “… prices were absolutely ruinous to his customers. He charged three dollars per pound for potatoes and butter, two dollars for flour, and so on in proportion, making everybody recognize that, if life was worth living, we certainly had to pay dearly to sustain it.”

The North Yuba Canyon from the Brandy City Trail

Cherokee Creek is a beautiful stream with plenty of riparian vegetation.  It has been heavily mined because it erodes the auriferous gravel deposits near Brandy City, a formerly productive hydraulic mining community.  Cherokee is the most popular Indian name for mining properties in California even though their homelands are in southern Appalachia.  In 1829 placer gold was discovered in their territory, from which they were eventually moved, but not before learning something about gold mining.  They were savvy miners when they arrived and I’m sure they took advantage of their knowledge.

You may or may not spot the trail to Brandy City that takes off from the Canyon Creek Trail below Cherokee Creek because it’s no longer maintained and there was ferocious logging on the upper reaches of this trail in the 1960s.  There’s not much to see there anymore because all the buildings are gone, although there is a small cemetery.  At one time this was an important hydraulic mining center with a sizable French population.  The Sierra Democrat of July 3, 1858 reported on a “Grand Ball at Brandy City – formerly Strychnine City – on the evening of the 27^th given by the Canyon Creek Ditch Company, and others, and you can bet it was a fine affair.  Seven of the ladies were taken to the Ball in a Concord A No 1 four horse coach. The balances were carried on horse and mule flesh and danced all night to broad daylight.”

Brandy City, 1900

Cross the foot bridge across Cherokee Creek and continue downstream to the south, then westerly, through a healthy forest of Douglas fir, yellow pine, incense cedar, black oak, live oak and broad-leaf maple.  This part of the trail is narrow and undulating like the original pack trail.

It was on this part of the trail on a narrow ridge toward the river where, in the late 1960s, you could see a tipi incongruously perched in a dense forest of oaks and conifers.  According to local rumors there was an attractive young woman who lived alone in that tipi.  Mister P., who worked for the Forest Service, heard the rumor and decided that he should investigate.  He told me that he found the tipi alright and as he walked toward it a nude woman stepped out to greet him.  Now Mister P. was a first-generation Italian American and a practicing Catholic who became quite agitated even as he was telling me the story.  He stood up and muttered “Mama Mia, Jesu Santo", and crossed himself several times before, red in the face, he made the universally understood “big boobs” gesture.  Actually, you had to have been there to fully appreciate his kinetic approach to storytelling.  Mister P. never told me what he and the woman talked about, but he was obviously concerned because he went to fetch the Ranger.  When they returned the Ranger verified Mister P.’s description of the situation and they apparently had a long conversation about safety.  It’s reassuring to know how responsive Forest Service management can be when the situation warrants it.

After crossing the small stream in Brummel Ravine, the trail descends to a dramatic confluence where Canyon Creek enters the North Yuba at Kelly Bar.  There’s a great swimming hole and campsite here.

Canyon Creek entering the North Yuba at Kelly Bar

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A REGIONAL HISTORY COURSE / YUBA RIVER COUNTRY

Mt. Lola / North-Central Sierra Nevada

“Exercise, not philosophically and with religious gravity undertaken, but with the wild and romping activities of a spirited girl who runs up and down as if her veins were full of wine.” - Lola Montez

THE MOUNT LOLA TRAIL

It’s mid-September and there’s a light rain in the Deer Creek watershed this morning.  Pluviophiles are ecstatic and the aroma of moist and earthy petrichor is positively swoony – meanwhile it’s snowing on Mt Lola.  A few days ago it was warm and we hiked to the summit from the east side so that’s what this blog will be about.  Mount Lola, at 9,143 feet is located in the extreme northeast of the South Yuba watershed and is its highest peak.  Immediately below and to the west is White Rock Lake.  On the east and north sides of Mount Lola, Independence Creek and Coldstream Creek flow to the Truckee River.

How to get there:

To get there take Highway 89 north from Truckee for 17 miles to the Jackson Meadow Road. Travel west for 2 miles to the well-marked Independence Lake turnoff. Drive 0.7 mile and cross the bridge over the Little Truckee River, then take the first right. This road is a segment of the historic Henness Pass Road. Drive 3.2 miles to the clearly marked trailhead and parking lot at Perrazzo Meadows.

This 5.4 mile long trail (one way) ascends Cold Stream Creek, a tributary of the Little Truckee River.  At the lower segment there is some logging evidence but there are also wildflowers and beautiful Cold Stream Meadow.  Above the meadow the slope becomes steeper climbing through stands of red fir and mountain hemlock.  Right alongside the trail is the largest red fir that I’ve ever seen.

Coldstream Meadow

From the eastside Mount Lola is a 2,500-foot climb, and worth it. As for degree of difficulty, well that depends.  This hike was an epiphany for me – when I last hiked this trail three years-ago I don’t remember it being particularly strenuous but now that I’m older (much older that most people reading this) it was difficult for me.  Men don’t want to admit that their performance is fading, but for me there was no denying it, and I had the realization that I might not do this hike again.  While I was humbled by the mountain and my own mortality, it didn’t diminish my experience, but my knees hurt.  From now on I’ll be factoring my own frailty into planning for future hikes.  All things considered this is valuable information for keeping hiking pleasurable for as long as possible.

Coming up the East Side of Mt Lola

The views from the summit are fabulous. On a clear day you can see Mount Lassen to the northwest and the distinctive Sierra Buttes in the same direction but only 20 miles away on the North Yuba River.  To the west are Grouse Ridge, Fall Creek Mountain and the Black Buttes in the Grouse Ridge Roadless Area.  Looking south you can see Basin Peak and Castle Peaks, and along the summit continuing southward to Donner Pass and Tinker Knob.  To the east is Mount Rose and to the northeast is Sierra Valley.  At the base of Mount Lola is White Rock Lake to the southwest and Independence Lake to the east.

White Rock Lake is the highest body of water in the South Yuba watershed.  Originally it was an aboriginal campsite, then in 1850 it was dammed when the water rights were claimed for gold mining.  The Pacific Crest Trail passes just south of White Rock Lake where there is a 2 ½ mile spur trail that ascends about 1,300’ to the top of Mt. Lola.

 Dusk on Mt Lola. Looking southwest to White Rock Lake

SURVEY HISTORY

On the summit of Mount Lola you’ll see a small rock structure and may wonder what it’s doing here.  In 1878 the newly named Coast and Geodetic Survey was surveying the west by triangulation, using very large constructs known as Davidson's Quadrilaterals with sides ranging from 57 to 142 miles in length. To do this work a station was established on Mount Shasta to measure the side between Mount Shasta and Mount Helena, which at about 192 miles would make it the longest triangulation line ever observed. The line Mount Lola to Mount Helena, one of the sides of Davidson's Quadrilaterals, 133 miles in length, was selected as the base for the triangle.

George Davidson was chosen to make the observations at Mount Lola and Benjamin Colonna was chosen for Mount Shasta. In his journal for August 1, 1878, Colonna described a momentous event:

At sunrise, I turned my telescope in the direction of MT LOLA, and there was the heliotrope, 169 miles off, shining like a star of the first magnitude. I gave a few flashes from my own, and they were at once answered by flashes from LOLA. Then turning my telescope in the direction of MT HELENA, there, too was a heliotrope, shining as prettily as the one at LOLA. My joy was very great; for the successful accomplishment of my mission was now secured.

In the center is the base of the heliotrope used in 1878

This series of flashes, through the wonders of trigonometry, allowed the team of surveyors to accurately calculate that the distance between Mount Shasta and Mount Helena was 192 miles. Colonna was ecstatic about besting the French, and wrote in his journal, “And the glory is ours; for America, and not Europe, can boast of the largest trigonometrical figures ever measured on the globe.”  So, these rock features are the foundation for the heliotrope and a shelter George Davidson used while waiting for optimal conditions in the summer of 1875.  Positions held by Davidson include president of the California Academy of Sciences from 1871 to 1887, Honorary Professor of Geodesy and Astronomy, and Regent of the University of California from 1877 to 1885.  He became the first professor of Geography at the University of California, Berkeley and was one of 182 charter members of the Sierra Club in 1892 and served as a member of its board of directors from 1894 to 1910.  This bit of scientific history may or may not be of interest to you, but surely you want to know who Lola Montez was?

Lola Montez 1850

Photo by Southworth and Hawes

Mount Lola was named for the legendary Lola Montez, who was born in Ireland in 1821 and originally named Elizabeth Rosanna Gilbert.  As part of a military family she spent her childhood in India and married for the first time at age 16, apparently to get back to Europe.  After her first marriage she traveled to Spain and developed a persona as a dancer, named herself Lola Montez and toured northern Europe.  She was, by all accounts, a mediocre dancer but what she lacked in talent she made up for in chutzpah.  Her fiery temperament, audaciousness and ambition landed her in the company of Franz Liszt, Robert Peel (son of the English Prime Minister), the French newspaper editor Alexandre Dujarier, Marius Petipa (the creator of Swan Lake and The Nutcracker), the Earl of Malmesbury, the Count of Schleissen, Lord Brougham, Jung Bahadur (the Nepalese ambassador to London) and other less notable men.

In 1846 she traveled to Munich and became a dancer with the Bavarian Opera.  When King Ludwig I of Bavaria saw her he wrote, “Today I saw Lola Montez dance. I am bewitched. In this Spanish woman alone have I found love and life.”  She thrived on scandal and she created enormous celebrity, even inspiring imitators. Some of her biographers claimed that Lola Montez garnered more press than Queen Victoria herself.  King Ludwig was totally enthralled, while Lola shamelessly manipulated him.  In August of 1847 he made her the Countess of Landsfeld, which assured her a salary, but the citizens of Munich were embarrassed by the foolishness of their King and distrusting of Montez. By 1848, under pressure from a growing revolutionary movement, Ludwig abdicated his throne and Lola fled Bavaria, alone.

From 1851 to 1853 she performed as a dancer and actress in the eastern United States.  One of her biographers said that she received higher fees for her lectures than Charles Dickens who was on tour at the same time.  Her most popular play was a trite, self-promotional story about her affair with King Ludwig.  She then moved to San Francisco in May of 1853. While there she performed her suggestive “Spider Dance” in which she pretended to be attacked by spiders and searched for them in her clothing.  Reviews of her performance were pretty bad, but they generated publicity, nevertheless.  She married Patrick Hull in July and they moved to Grass Valley, California, in August.

Lola Montez 1858

National Portrait Gallery – Smithsonian Institution

Photo by Henry Meade 

Glamorous and boldly unconventional, Lola attracted an enthusiastic following based more on her cultivated persona and her beauty than on her talent – she definitely had her wild side.  In the summer of 1854 one of the most famous camping trips of the era occurred in the vicinity of what would later become Mt Lola and Lola Montez Lakes. She, and some companions, left Grass Valley for a sojourn to Donner Summit and Truckee Meadows (now Reno, NV). The party, which included Alonzo Delano, famous humorist and Grass Valley’s first city treasurer, set off with an animal pack train in mid-July and ran into difficulties after several rough days on the trail.  The horse carrying the provisions bolted and dumped all their food in a stream.  If that wasn’t bad enough, the imperious Lola quarreled with the other campers and antagonized them to the point where many of them left in a huff.

While living in Grass Valley she held salons in which the local intelligentsia gathered to meet artists, actors, writers, entrepreneurs and adventurers.  Her benefactor at this time was John Southwick, manager and part-owner of the Empire Mine.  By the time she arrived in Grass Valley she had been married twice and had many amorous alliances.  She was also fluent in several languages, was abreast of contemporary literary and artistic trends and mixed with Gautier, Alexander Dumas, George Sand, Walt Whitman and others.  The salons at her house included rich feasts with champagne.  Guests included, businessman Sam Brannan; US Supreme Court Justice Steven Field; William M. Stewart, later a U.S. senator from Nevada; the great Norwegian violist, Ole Bull and humorist Alonzo Delano, among many others. Biographer Ralph Freidman (Lola Montez in Grass Valley, 1951) commented, “…she was probably the least provincial person to ever reside in Grass Valley.”  When she left town in 1855, W.B. Ewer, editor of the Grass Valley Telegraph said “Lola is no ordinary person.  She is possessed of an original mind, one decidedly intellectual and highly cultivated.  She delights in change and excitement and is bound to create a sensation wherever she goes.”

In May of 1855 Lola Montez and an actor named Augustus Noel Follin decided to take a theatre company to Australia where gold had recently been discovered.  The foray created more scandal and notoriety but no wealth.  In June of 1860, while living in New York, she suffered a stroke that resulted in partial paralysis.  She then found religion, but contracted pneumonia and died in 1861 at the age of 42.

Lola Montez, despite her infamy, created her own myth and wrote herself into history by the force of her own personality.   The many biographies written about her dwell on her outrageous behavior, but I’m sure she was also charming and interesting to be with.  Unlike many other women in the Victorian era, who may have been notable because of their birth, or marriage, she invented herself.  Lola Montez described herself best when she dedicated her 1858 book, The Art of Beauty, to “those who are not afraid of themselves, who trust so much in their souls that they dare to stand up in the might of their own individuality to meet the tidal currents of the world.”

Dusk on Mt. Lola. Sierra Buttes to the Northwest

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