CARSON CITY, NEVADA TO SACREMENTO, CA BY WAY OF THE GOLD MINING TOWNS OF SIERRAVILLE AND DOWNIEVILLE

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CARSON CITY, NEVADA TO SACREMENTO, CA BY WAY OF THE GOLD MINING TOWNS OF SIERRAVILLE AND DOWNIEVILLE

Thursday, June 7^th

Comstock RV Park, Carson City, Nevada-- 59 degrees at 9:15 with blue skies. Our starting mileage today is 27,122.

First thing we did this morning was to go by the Chevy Dealer and talk to them about our brakes and our oil level. Apparently, when we had the oil changed at the Wal-Mart in Pahrump they didn’t reset the sensor. We needed some assurance that everything with our brakes was ok before we tackled the next leg of our trip over the mountains.

We headed down to the Nevada State Library to look at the Esmeralda Union Newspaper. When we were in the Law’s Museum looking at the documents that they had, the historian pulled out a file on O. L. Matthews that had one sheet of paper in it. The one line on the paper stated that he killed a man, according to this Nevada paper, and gave the date and page number. Esmeralda County is the county in Nevada right next to Inyo County and the narrow gauge railroad went between the two. The Inyo Register that we looked through for several days started from about 1870 and this incident happened before that. Anyway, we found the article and it stated that O.L. Matthews did indeed kill a man with his derringer. The man, a Mr. Gill, had held a pistol to Matthews’ head while he was whipping him. There was no way to follow up on the outcome of this, which is frustrating. Documents are just not there after the courthouse burned twice during the time that our family was there.

We left the State Capitol area and continued up highway 395 and through Reno until we hit Interstate 80 and turned due west. We very quickly climbed up over 3000 feet into the Sierra Nevada Mountains with their heavy pine and fir forests. Just at the intersection to the town of Truckee, we turned off I80 onto highway 89. A few miles along the road we came to a day use/picnic area that was the winter camping spot for part of the ill-fated Donner Party that broke off and went in this direction. We had lunch there and watched a goodly number of hikers wander off to hike the various trails.

We took this road to the community of Sierraville, which is where our some of our great aunts and their husbands lived during the 1880-1900’s. The husbands were lumbermen who provided lumber to some of the Nevada mines. This town sits in a very pretty, large valley and had many lovely ranches with fat cattle grazing in the green fields.

Our great-great grandmother, Mahala Reed Hardy, died in this town while staying/living with her daughter after her husband had died in 1890. We wanted to find her gravesite. So, we talked to the people in the feed store and they directed us to the old cemetery that sits up on a hill. We walked the cemetery, but were unable to find her grave although we did find the graves of one of her daughter’s and her husband.

We then stopped by the tiny Post Office and talked to the postmistress who we had learned was the historian in this community. She and her family currently own the property that our family once lived on although the houses have since burned to the ground. She gave us some information out of her files about the Hardy family and promised to look to see if she had some more, especially photos.

We left the valley on highway 49 and quickly climbed higher up an extremely windy, narrow road. We entered the Tahoe National Forest and headed for a campground on the swiftly flowing Salmon Creek for the night. Although there was a “host” trailer set in a camping space, no one seemed to be around.

Friday, June 8^th

Salmon Creek Campground in the Tahoe National Forest near the town of Sierra City. 9:20 and 53 degrees with blue skies with a few white clouds. Starting mileage is 27,242

I was surprised to see a few people out and about this morning. They must have been camped further down the creek in this campground, as we didn’t see a soul last night. The Host returned this morning also to check things out. This morning as we headed down the side road back to highway 49, we could clearly see Salmon Creek drop into a waterfall and the spectacular Sierra Buttes with some snow still on them.

We drove the windy, windy road to Downieville, finally arriving, after being stopped several long times waiting for road construction. The road is consistent in its curves and narrowness, but extremely scenic as it follows the Yuba River and its’ several forks. Downieville is a mining town on the banks of the Yuba River and is where our Great-great grandparents settled and mined for gold after coming from Illinois in 1849-1851. Our great grandfather, George Hardy, Jr., was born and grew up here before going to SF to college to become a teacher. He then began his teaching in Inyo County where we had been researching for the last couple of weeks.

We found the old, old cemetery perched on the side of a hill and found George Hardy, Sr.’s. grave site. His granddaughter, Mahala Belle Alexander, who grew up in this town and was Superintendent of the County School System, is buried next to him.

Downieville is like many mining towns in that it clings to the sides of the cliffs on both sides of the river with very little space for buildings. What is funny, in this century, is that this town lost the vote to be a capitol of California by only 10 votes. There is very little room for this tiny town, let alone the Capitol of the State of California. They would have had to bulldoze down many mountains tops to have the space.

The tiny local museum finally opened and we found some faded family photos and a desk that George Hardy Sr. made for his children to use in school. Took pictures and then headed to the County Courthouse that was located across the river over a one lane bridge. There we were able to look in some original newspapers and found the obits of our great-great grandparents. The newspapers were just stored on the top shelf of some records and there wasn’t a place for us to sit and look through them, so we got those two items we had dates for, and called it a day. Valerie did find the deed for the property the locals still call the Hardy Ranch. The ranch was located a couple miles upriver from Downieville and was their mining claim on the Yuba River of some 157 or so acres including an area of flat meadow where they ranched and grew produce for the town.

We drove down the mountain about 10 miles and down a few 1000 feet and found the Indian Valley Campground to camp at. Since it was the weekend we found many campers there with us this night.

Saturday, June 9^th

Indian Valley Campground in the Tahoe National Forest

Since we were heading to Sacramento to visit the State Archives and Library, we searched for a campground or RV park there and could not find anything. We also knew that we were heading into the “Central Valley,” which has always been HOT! Since we were less than 100 miles from Sacramento, we decided to spend another day at this campground doing nada so we could hit the library on Monday. We also decided to use some points and stay at a hotel/motel for a couple of days south of Sacramento.

Sunday, June 10^th

at Indian Valley Campground. 65 degrees with blue skies. Starting mileage is 27, 274

Decided to drive to Grass Valley for breakfast and make a phone call to the Holiday Inn reservation system. Our cell phone did not have a signal for almost all of the time we were on highway 49 as the mountains were just too rugged and the population is too small. I think Downieville’s population is about 200 and Sierraville about the same. The day after we were there, the high school in Downieville was graduating 4 students—the lady at the museum said everyone in town would be there. The drive down the mountain was as rough as the drive up----curves and more curves. Highway 49 has to be one of the curviest roads we have ever been on. It took us so long to drive the few miles down that it was nearly lunch time when we had “breakfast” in Grass Valley. Pretty drive with all kinds of wildflowers growing in rock crevasses and on the sides of the road. One bush that was blooming profusely looked like white lilacs.

Dropped onto Interstate 80 and headed into the outskirts of Sacramento and checked into our hotel. Didn’t do much for the rest of the day but work on the internet and our blog.

Monday, June 11^th

Holiday Inn in Fair Oaks, CA. warm, warm this morning

Drove Rosie to the parking lot at the end of the light rail line. It cost one dollar to park all day. The light rail line cost each of us a $1.25 to take it into downtown to the State Archives. Surprisingly, there is actually a stop downtown called Archives Plaza that is right in front of the building we needed to visit. We were looking for a couple things. Did the State have incorporation paperwork on any of the businesses our grandfather operated? That was a resounding NO.

At the State Library, one block up, we were looking for a better copy of the obit of Mahala Hardy as the one from Downieville had the bottom cut off. Found that and found where she is buried. The person who had surveyed the cemetery in Sierraville had indexed her under her daughter’s last name of Joy instead of Hardy. So she is buried in the cemetery we wandered through, just not sure exactly where. After eating a late, late lunch in town, we took the train---more like an electric street car---back to Rosie and then back to the hotel.

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