The Iron Door Saloon is located at 18761 Main Street in Groveland, California, about twenty-five miles from the entrance of Yosemite National Park. According to its proprietors, it is the oldest continuously operating saloon in California. It remains a popular tourist stop on the main road between The Bay Area and Yosemite.
James Tannahill was the first owner of the Granite Store, built of granite, which would later become the Iron Door Saloon. It was built before 1852 in Big Oak Flat, which was renamed Groveland in 1863 when James Tannahill became its first postmaster, and the store its first post office. It first became a saloon, called "Jake's Place", in 1896 when it was purchased by Giacomo DeFarrari.
The building was renamed "The Iron Door Saloon" in 1937, after iron doors, hauled in by mules, were installed. The building was remodeled at that time to add a second story where cards, billiards, and pool were offered for diversion. The doors were meant to aid in fire prevention in case neighboring buildings caught fire.
The interior has the typical decor of an old saloon, with the original bar intact. The ceiling is adorned with dollar bills and historical artifacts. Live music is offered on the weekends. [1] [2]
Yosemite National Park is an American national park in California, surrounded on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The park is managed by the National Park Service and covers an area of 759,620 acres and sits in four counties – centered in Tuolumne and Mariposa, extending north and east to Mono and south to Madera County. Designated a World Heritage Site in 1984, Yosemite is internationally recognized for its granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, giant sequoia groves, lakes, mountains, meadows, glaciers, and biological diversity. Almost 95% of the park is designated wilderness.
Yosemite Valley is a glacial valley in Yosemite National Park in the western Sierra Nevada mountains of Central California. The valley is about 7.5 mi (12.1 km) long and 3,000–3,500 ft (910–1,070 m) deep, surrounded by high granite summits such as Half Dome and El Capitan, and densely forested with pines. The valley is drained by the Merced River, and a multitude of streams and waterfalls flow into it, including Tenaya, Illilouette, Yosemite and Bridalveil Creeks. Yosemite Falls is the highest waterfall in North America and is a big attraction especially in the spring, when the water flow is at its peak. The valley is renowned for its natural environment and is regarded as the centerpiece of Yosemite National Park.
The Sierra Nevada is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primarily in Nevada. The Sierra Nevada is part of the American Cordillera, an almost continuous chain of mountain ranges that forms the western "backbone" of the Americas.
Half Dome is a granite dome at the eastern end of Yosemite Valley in Yosemite National Park, California. It is a well-known rock formation in the park, named for its distinct shape. One side is a sheer face while the other three sides are smooth and round, making it appear like a dome cut in half. The granite crest rises more than 4,737 ft (1,444 m) above the valley floor.
Tuolumne County, officially the County of Tuolumne, is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2010 census, the population was 54,539. The county seat and only incorporated city is Sonora.
Mount Whitney is the highest mountain in the contiguous United States and the Sierra Nevada, with an elevation of 14,505 feet (4,421 m). It is in East–Central California, on the boundary between California's Inyo and Tulare counties, 84.6 miles (136.2 km) west-northwest of North America's lowest point, Badwater Basin in Death Valley National Park, at 282 ft (86 m) below sea level. The mountain's west slope is in Sequoia National Park and the summit is the southern terminus of the John Muir Trail, which runs 211.9 mi (341.0 km) from Happy Isles in Yosemite Valley. The eastern slopes are in Inyo National Forest in Inyo County.
Fresno Yosemite International Airport is a joint civil-military airport in Fresno, California, United States. It is the primary commercial airport for the San Joaquin Valley and three national parks: Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon. It offers scheduled passenger flights to several major airline hubs in the United States and international service to Mexico. The facility opened in June 1942 as Hammer Field, a military airfield. The airport is owned and operated by the city of Fresno and operates two runways on a property spanning 1,728 acres (699 ha). Its airport code 'FAT' stands for "Fresno Air Terminal," a former name for the airport.
Stanislaus National Forest is a U.S. National Forest which manages 898,099 acres of land in four counties in the Sierra Nevada in Northern California. It was established on February 22, 1897, making it one of the oldest national forests. It was named after the Stanislaus River.
Human habitation in the Sierra Nevada region of California reaches back 8,000 to 10,000 years ago. Historically attested Native American populations, such as the Sierra Miwok, Mono and Paiute, belong to the Uto-Aztecan and Utian phyla. In the mid-19th century, a band of Native Americans called the Ahwahnechee lived in Yosemite Valley. The California Gold Rush greatly increased the number of non-indigenous people in the region. Tensions between Native Americans and white settlers escalated into the Mariposa War. As part of this conflict, settler James Savage led the Mariposa Battalion into Yosemite Valley in 1851, in pursuit of Ahwaneechees led by Chief Tenaya. The California state military forces burned the tribe's villages, destroyed their food stores, killed the chief's sons, and forced the tribe out of Yosemite. Accounts from the Mariposa Battalion, especially from Dr. Lafayette Bunnell, popularized Yosemite Valley as a scenic wonder.
Camp Tawonga is a 160-acre residential Jewish summer camp located on the middle fork of the Tuolumne River, a few miles west of Yosemite National Park, in the Stanislaus National Forest. The camp operates as a non-profit organization and is affiliated with the Jewish Community Center Association. The camp is located in Groveland, California, although the nearest town is actually a tiny area called Buck Meadows. Tawonga has its main office in San Francisco. Many attendees come from the San Francisco Bay Area, but attendees from Israel, Los Angeles, and other states are often present as well.
The LeConte Memorial Lodge, now known as the Yosemite Conservation Heritage Center, is a structure in Yosemite National Park in California, United States. LeConte is spelled variously as Le Conte or as Leconte. Built in 1903 by the Sierra Club, it is nearly unique within the National Park Service system as a high-quality example of Tudor Revival architecture, and is an important early expression of the Club's mission. The lodge was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1987.
Groveland is a census-designated place (CDP) in Tuolumne County, California. Groveland sits at an elevation of 3,136 feet (956 m). The 2020 United States census reported Groveland's population was 540.
National Park Service rustic – sometimes colloquially called Parkitecture – is a style of architecture that developed in the early and middle 20th century in the United States National Park Service (NPS) through its efforts to create buildings that harmonized with the natural environment. Since its founding in 1916, the NPS sought to design and build visitor facilities without visually interrupting the natural or historic surroundings. The early results were characterized by intensive use of hand labor and a rejection of the regularity and symmetry of the industrial world, reflecting connections with the Arts and Crafts movement and American Picturesque architecture. Architects, landscape architects and engineers combined native wood and stone with convincingly native styles to create visually appealing structures that seemed to fit naturally within the majestic landscapes. Examples of the style can be found in numerous types of National Park structures, including entrance gateways, hotels and lodges, park roads and bridges, visitor centers, trail shelters, informational kiosks, and even mundane maintenance and support facilities. Many of these buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Little Yosemite Valley is a smaller glacial valley upstream in the Merced River drainage from the Yosemite Valley in Yosemite National Park. The Merced River meanders through the 3.5 mi (5.6 km) long flat valley, draining out over Nevada Fall and Vernal Fall before emptying into the main Yosemite Valley. It can be reached by a day hike from the main valley, and is the most popular area in the Yosemite Wilderness. The Valley provides access to nearby destinations such as the back side of Half Dome, Clouds Rest and the High Sierra Camp at Merced Lake.
The Main Street Historic District in Miles City, Montana comprises much of the central business district of the town, extending along Main Street roughly between Prairie Avenue and Fourth Street. It was listed as a historic district on the National Register of Historic Places in 1989.
The Hotel Charlotte, also known as Hotel Charlotte & Cafe or Hotel Charlotte & Restaurant, is a hotel opened in 1921 in Groveland, California. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1994.
The Carl Albert Federal Building is a historic courthouse located in McAlester, Oklahoma. Built in 1914, the facility was renamed in 1985 in honor of former Speaker of the House Carl Albert, a native of the town. It previously served the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.
The Rim Fire was a massive wildfire that started in a remote canyon in Stanislaus National Forest, in California. This portion of the central Sierra Nevada spans Tuolumne and Mariposa counties. The fire started on August 17, 2013, during the 2013 California wildfire season, and grew to be the third-largest wildfire in California's history, having burned 257,314 acres. As of 2018, the Rim Fire was California's fifth-largest modern wildfire. As of 2013, the Rim Fire is the largest wildfire on record in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. The Rim Fire was fully contained on Thursday, October 24, 2013, after a nine-week firefighting battle. Due to a lack of winter rains, some logs smoldered in the interior portion of the fire throughout the winter. More than a year passed before it was declared out on November 4, 2014.
The South Main Street Historic District is a surviving collection of eleven commercial buildings built from 1877 to 1915 in the old downtown of Oregon, Wisconsin, plus the WWI memorial. It was added to the State and the National Register of Historic Places in 2000.
The Ferguson Fire was a wildfire in the Sierra National Forest, Stanislaus National Forest and Yosemite National Park in California in the United States. The fire was reported on July 13, 2018, burning 96,901 acres (392 km2), before it was 100% contained on August 19, 2018. Interior areas of the fire continued to smolder and burn until September 19, 2018, when InciWeb declared the fire to be inactive. The Ferguson Fire was caused by the superheated fragments of a faulty vehicle catalytic converter igniting vegetation. The fire, which burned mostly in inaccessible wildland areas of the national forest, impacted recreational activities in the area, including in Yosemite National Park, where Yosemite Valley and Wawona were closed. The Ferguson fire caused at least $171.2 million in damages, with a suppression cost of $118.5 million and economic losses measuring $52.7 million. Two firefighters were killed and nineteen others were injured in the fire.