Onion Valley, California | |
|---|---|
Former settlement | |
  Onion Valley, California  Onion Valley, California | |
| Coordinates: 39°47′45″N120°52′55″W / 39.79583°N 120.88194°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | California |
| County | Plumas |
| Elevation | 6,292 ft (1,918 m) |
| Time zone | UTC-8 (Pacific (PST)) |
| • Summer (DST) | UTC-7 (PDT) |
| GeoNames feature ID | 5379432 |
| Reference no. | 723 |
Onion Valley, California is a former California gold rush mining settlement and supply station [1] in Plumas County, California, United States.
Onion Valley was located on Onion Valley Creek northeast of La Porte, California at the foot of Pilot Peak.
Note that the California counties of Inyo, Sierra, Placer, Amador and Calaveras have other locations with the same name.
As a Gold Rush community, [2] population may have peaked at 1,500 in 1851. [3] By 1853, only 120 settlers are noted. [4]
Organized ski club downhill speed races were held at Onion Valley in 1861, [5] with Sierra longboard skis referred to as "Norwegian snow-shoes". California Historical Landmarks No. 723 and 724 reference Onion Valley as a pioneer organized ski club in America. [6]
The 1880 population was listed as 23. A hotel [7] and the Eclipse mine was in the area. [8]
Photographs capture the decline of the area's human structures from 1905 [9] to 1953. [10]
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.
La Porte is a census-designated place (CDP) in Plumas County, California, United States. The population was 65 at the 2020 census. The town was first known as Rabbit Creek until 1857.
The Gold Country is a historic region in the northern portion of the U.S. state of California, that is primarily on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada. It is famed for the mineral deposits and gold mines that attracted waves of immigrants, known as the 49ers, during the 1849 California Gold Rush.
James Mason Hutchings was an American businessman and one of the principal promoters of what is now Yosemite National Park.
Palisades Tahoe is a ski resort in the western United States, located in Olympic Valley, California, northwest of Tahoe City in the Sierra Nevada range. From its founding in 1949, the resort was known as Squaw Valley, but it changed its name in 2021 due to the derogatory connotations of the word "squaw". It was the host site for the 1960 Winter Olympics.
Lassen National Forest is a United States national forest of 1,700 square miles (4,300 km2) in northeastern California. It is named after pioneer Peter Lassen, who mined, ranched and promoted the area to emigrant parties in the 1850s.
Plumas National Forest is a 1,146,000-acre (4,640 km2) United States National Forest located at the northern terminus of the Sierra Nevada, in northern California. The Forest was named after its primary watershed, the Rio de las Plumas, or Feather River.
Beckwourth Pass is the lowest mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range at an elevation of 5,221 feet (1,591 m).
Kiandra is an abandoned gold mining town and the birthplace of Australian skiing. The town is situated in the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales, Australia, in the Snowy Monaro Regional Council inside the Kosciuszko National Park. Its name is a corruption of Aboriginal 'Gianderra' for 'sharp stones for knives'. It was earlier called Gibson's Plains, named after a Dr. Gibson, a settler in the district in 1839. For a century, Kiandra was Australia's highest town.
The Palisades Tahoe Aerial Tram is a 1.5-mile (2.4 km) long aerial tramway at the Palisades Tahoe ski resort in Olympic Valley, California. It was inaugurated in 1968, and was called the Cable Car. At its opening, it was the largest tramway in the world, built by an Austrian company Garaventa. It carries passengers from the Base Camp at 6,200 feet (1,889m) elevation to High Camp at 8,200 feet (2,499m) elevation. The tram operated operates year-round.
James Sather Hutchinson (1867–1959) was a lawyer in San Francisco, California, a mountaineer and an environmentalist. He was most noted for being an explorer of the Sierra Nevada.
The Kiandra Snow Shoe Club was founded in the gold-mining district of Kiandra, New South Wales (NSW), Australia by three Norwegians—as early as 1861 by some accounts— and reportedly became the "world's longest continuously running ski club" as it evolved into the present-day Kiandra Pioneer Ski Club in Perisher Valley, NSW. Whether the club is the first of its kind has been subject to debate. In this case, "snow shoe" is an archaic term for "ski".
Plumas-Eureka State Park is a California state park located in the Sierra Nevada and Cascade Range in Plumas County, California.
Skiing in Australia takes place in the Australian Alps in the states of New South Wales, Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory as well as in the mountains of the island state Tasmania, during the Southern Hemisphere winter.
Skiing in New South Wales takes place in the high country of the Snowy Mountains of New South Wales during the Southern Hemisphere winter.
The Plumas County Museum is a 501(c)3 organization and historical museum located in Quincy, California. Exhibits focus on Plumas County, including the Maidu people, the California Gold Rush, the logging industry, and the local community.
Mount Lincoln is an 8,383-foot-elevation (2,555 meter) mountain summit in Placer County, California, United States.
The Lost Sierra is the northern Sierra Nevada region in California in the United States. It encompasses the area of Plumas and Sierra Counties.
Plumas House was a historical building in Quincy, California. The site of the Plumas House building is a California Historical Landmark No. 480. The first building at the site was built in 1853. The second building that replaced the original was built by James and Jane Edwards in 1866. The Edwards building was a Hotel with a Ballroom, restaurant, and parlor. The Hotel caught fire on June 23, 1923, with no hope to save it. The fire did not spread to other buildings with the help of the volunteer fire department. The two buildings served the town and the 49er California Gold Rush miners. The town of Quincy was named by James Bradley after his hometown of Quincy, Illinois. The Plumas House was busy, as Quincy was the county seat for Plumas County. A historical marker is in the town center park at the Southwest corner of Main Street and Court Street.
