French Lake | |
|---|---|
Former settlement | |
| Coordinates: 39°25′14″N120°32′27″W / 39.420556°N 120.540833°W | |
| Country |  United States |
| State |  California |
| County | Nevada County |
French Lake, California [1] located in Nevada County, was a California Gold Rush community, now uninhabited. It was located by a lake of the same name.
| French Lake | |
|---|---|
 Southwest shore of French Lake, 2010 | |
  French Lake | |
| Location | Nevada County, California |
| Coordinates | 39°25′14″N120°32′31″W / 39.42056°N 120.54194°W |
| Basin countries | United States |
| Surface elevation | 6,676 ft (2,035 m) |
French Lake Reservoir, at an elevation of 7500’-6680’, [2] is part of a string of lakes, including Bowman Lake, Sawmill Lake, and Faucherie Lake to the northwest, as well as Meadow Lake and Fordyce Lake to the southeast. French Lake Road, used by the Nevada Irrigation District and not available for public use, skirts the lake's northwest perimeter before heading east to Meadow Lake Road. An unsigned road near the lake's southeastern banks veers northeast to Meadow Lake Road above English Mountain's now uninhabited Baltimore Town and Summit City in unincorporated Nevada County. [3] [4]
Prior to the Maidu, French Lake was inhabited by the Martis people, a now extinct Native American tribe. The Martis' Meadow Lake Petroglyphs (also known as 4-Nev-3) are a historical landmark. [5]
In 1878, the world's first long-distance telephone line operated between French Lake and French Corral, California, 58 miles to the west, including the towns of North San Juan, and North Bloomfield on the phone route. [6] [7] The phone line was used to pass information regarding water flow from French Lake for post-California Gold Rush hydraulic mining.
Nevada County is a county located in the U.S. state of California, in the Sierra Nevada. As of the 2020 census, its population was 102,241. The county seat is Nevada City. Nevada County comprises the Truckee-Grass Valley micropolitan statistical area, which is also included in the Sacramento-Roseville combined statistical area, part of the Mother Lode Country.
Plumas County is a county in the Sierra Nevada of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 19,790. The county seat is Quincy, and the only incorporated city is Portola. The largest community in the county is East Quincy. The county was named for the Spanish Río de las Plumas, which flows through it. The county itself is also the namesake of a native moth species, Hadena plumasata.
Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park is a state park unit preserving the largest hydraulic mining site in California, United States. The mine was one of several hydraulic mining sites at the center of the 1882 landmark case Woodruff v. North Bloomfield Mining and Gravel Company. The mine pit and several Gold Rush-era buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the Malakoff Diggins-North Bloomfield Historic District. The "canyon" is 7,000 feet (2,100 m) long, as much as 3,000 feet (910 m) wide, and nearly 600 feet (180 m) deep in places. Visitors can see huge cliffs carved by mighty streams of water, results of the mining technique of washing away entire mountains of gravel to wash out the gold. The park is a 26-mile (42 km) drive north-east of Nevada City, California, in the Gold Rush country. The 3,143-acre (1,272 ha) park was established in 1965.
The Yuba River is a tributary of the Feather River in the Sierra Nevada and eastern Sacramento Valley, in the U.S. state of California. The main stem of the river is about 40 miles (64 km) long, and its headwaters are split into three major forks. The Yuba River proper is formed at the North Yuba and Middle Yuba rivers' confluence, with the South Yuba joining a short distance downstream. Measured to the head of the North Yuba River, the Yuba River is just over 100 miles (160 km) long.
Hell Hole Reservoir is an artificial, crescent-shaped lake in the Sierra Nevada mountain range 10 miles (16 km) west of Lake Tahoe in California, United States. The lake is about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) long when at full capacity.
Beckwourth Pass is the lowest mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range at an elevation of 5,221 feet (1,591 m).
U.S. Route 50 (US 50) is a transcontinental highway in the United States, stretching from West Sacramento, California, in the west to Ocean City, Maryland, on the east coast. The Nevada portion crosses the center of the state and was named "The Loneliest Road in America" by Life magazine in July 1986. The name was intended as a pejorative, but Nevada officials seized it as a marketing slogan. The name originates from large desolate areas traversed by the route, with few or no signs of civilization. The highway crosses several large desert valleys separated by numerous mountain ranges towering over the valley floors, in what is known as the Basin and Range province of the Great Basin.
French Corral is an unincorporated community approximately five miles west of California State Highway 49 in Nevada County, California, United States.
U.S. Route 395 (US 395) is a United States Numbered Highway, stretching from Hesperia, California to the Canadian border in Laurier, Washington. The California portion of US 395 is a 557-mile (896 km) route which traverses from Interstate 15 (I-15) in Hesperia, north to the Oregon state line in Modoc County near Goose Lake. The route clips into Nevada, serving the cities Carson City and Reno, before returning to California.
Plumas-Eureka State Park is a California state park located in the Sierra Nevada and Cascade Range in Plumas County, California.
The Lahontan Valley is a basin in Churchill County, Nevada, United States. The valley is a landform of the central portion of the prehistoric Lake Lahontan's lakebed of 20,000-9,000 years ago. The valley and the adjacent Carson Sink represent a small portion of the lake bed. Humboldt Lake is to the valley's northeast. Pyramid Lake is west. Walker Lake is to the south. The valley is part of the larger Great Basin Desert, however during the California Gold Rush the valley was often called the Forty Mile Desert.
The world's first long-distance telephone line, established in 1877, connected French Corral with Bowman Lake at the headwaters of the Yuba River. It was strung across trees and poles for a distance of 60 mi (97 km) in Nevada County, California, passing through Birchville, Sweetland, North San Juan, Cherokee, North Columbia, Lake City, North Bloomfield, Moores Flat, Graniteville, and Milton.
North San Juan is a census-designated place in Nevada County, California, United States, along State Route 49 on the San Juan Ridge in Gold Country. The zip code is 95960. The population was 269 at the 2010 census.
Martis is the name given by scientists to the group of Native Americans who lived in Northern California on both the eastern and western sides of the Sierra Nevada. The Martis complex lasted from 2000 BCE to 500 CE, during the Middle Archaic era. Evidence of Martis habitation has been found from Carson River and Reno, Nevada in the east to Auburn, California and Oroville, California in the west. The Martis name refers to the geographic region of Martis Creek which spans Nevada County, California and Placer County, California.
Gold Hill in Grass Valley, California, was the site of one of the first discoveries of quartz gold in California. While quartz gold was also found in other areas of Nevada County, California during the same time, it is this find near Wolf Creek that led to quartz-mining frenzy and subsequent creation of the Gold Country quartz-mining industry. The location is honored as a California Historical Landmark.
Baltimore Town, previously Wightman’s Camp, was a historic gold mining camp in eastern Nevada County, California that was founded in 1865. After gold mining stopped in the area, the town faded away around 1869.
Bridgeport is a former settlement on the Yuba River in Nevada County, California, 2 mi (3.2 km) from the town of French Corral. Its elevation is 567 ft (173 m) above sea level.
Cherokee is a former gold mining community in Nevada County, California. As explained below, it has also been known as Patterson, Melrose and Tyler. It is located on the San Juan Ridge about 4 miles east of North San Juan. Its elevation is 2,516 ft (767 m) above sea level.
Pinecrest is an unincorporated community in the Stanislaus National Forest in Tuolumne County, California, United States. Pinecrest is located near Pinecrest Lake northeast of Mi-Wuk Village. Pinecrest Lake sits in what was once a meadow surrounded by granite outcroppings. Originally, Pinecrest Lake was called Strawberry Flat because of the wild strawberries that once grew there. In the 1960s the name was officially changed to Pinecrest. Pinecrest is a community of USFS Recreation Residences authorized by the United States Forest Service under the Occupancy Permits Act. The campground adjacent to the lake is under the white fir, cedar, and sugar pine trees.
Meadow Lake was a historic mining town in Nevada County, California. It was located on the southwest shore of Meadow Lake, about 18 miles northwest of Truckee as the crow flies. Situated at an elevation of 7,290 ft (2,220 m) above sea level, the reservoir of the same name is one of the highest lakes in elevation within the Tahoe National Forest.
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