When gardening is an addiction, no expanse of perfectly-manicured green lawn is ever large enough. Yet another reason for expanding the greenbelt: fresh edges for new flower beds. As you can see, projects like this call for certain must-have gardening equipment. A mini-tiller to make short work of digging trenches. A handy roll-around metal tool tray to keep those sprinkler parts organized and […]
Silver Lake Hotel
The ad announcing the opening of the Silver Lake Hotel in June, 1866 spared no adjectives. The air was “pure,” the scenery “delightful,” the lake itself “bottomless” and “abounding with delicious trout.” And if “sweltering mortals” from Sacramento and San Joaquin needed further inducement to travel the Amador Road for a visit, the proprietors urged […]
Making a Hoop Skirt
Those fabulous Civil War-era dresses came by their bell shape honestly — yards and yards of fabric, with some generous help from a hidden hoop underskirt. Sewing an overskirt is easy enough — so how hard could it be to make a proper hoop petticoat? I started my adventure with an online pattern, found here. It was, well, a […]
Markleeville’s Mercury Hill
There’s a peculiar red streak in the cliff just south of Hangman’s bridge. Blink and you’ll miss it; today, most people drive by without a glance. But to Markleeville old-timers, this was where a valuable mineral resource was mined. Back in the day, homes were roofed with simple wooden shingles. Jacob Marklee himself is said to […]
Markleeville Cave
The year was 1864. William A. Johnson, road superintendent for Carr & Co., was building a new toll road from Markleeville to the booming mining camp of Silver Mountain. There was just one obstacle in his way: Captain Jim, a Washo Chief. The new toll road, it seems, was passing too close for comfort to […]
Julian Maisterrena
He was a big man with a large moustache and outsized energy. Born in 1874 in Villa de Maya, Spain, Julian Maisterrena was a Spanish Basque who came to this country at the age of 19 with his pockets empty. Julian worked in sawmills and as a sheepherder, and tucked his meager salary away. Before […]
Civil War Fashion
Women’s fashion during the Civil War was really something. Dresses ran the gamut depending on the woman’s imagination — and whether she was wealthy enough to afford a high-end sewing maven to craft clothes for her. It was, after all, a time of war. So even women’s dresses often took on a “military” look. But […]
Alpine County’s First D.A.
We stumbled across the grave of Robert Marshall Briggs the other day in St. Patrick’s Cemetery in Jackson. It was a familiar name from Alpine’s early days. And that led to a story about a bandit, a hanging, how Mono County got its beautiful courthouse — and Alpine County’s very first D.A.. Robert M. Briggs […]
This Charming Markleeville Cottage Has a Story
One glance, and you just know this Markleeville cottage has a story! And quite a story it is. In 1864, this was the site of the Empire Meat Market, owned by a butcher named M. Peltier. To help promote sales, Peltier hired Augustus T. “Gus” Lee to run a meat wagon peddling his meat to outlying communities […]
Markleeville’s Oldest House?
This charming cottage may hold a giant secret: it just could be Markleeville’s oldest surviving original structure from its Silver Rush heydays. We know that the home is over a century old – photographs show it in 1905, when it served as the residence of George and Nellie Koenig. (George owned a bar known as Koenig’s Exchange, conveniently located […]
Silver Mountain City’s Stone Jail
If you’ve ever traveled California’s lonely Highway 4, you may have seen these mysterious stone ruins. They’re one of the few tangible remains of Silver Mountain City, Alpine County’s original county seat. This was the county’s jail, built in 1867 and built to last! Eighteen-inch outer walls were hewn from the volcanic cliff east of […]
Fredericksburg Cemetery Tale
Fredericksburg Cemetery It’s a tiny gem of a cemetery, nestled on the eastern shoulder of the great Sierra Nevada. It’s also the last remaining vestige of the once-thriving ghost town of Fredericksburg, one of Alpine County’s earliest settlements. Since its first burial in 1895, Fredericksburg Cemetery has become the final resting place for many Alpine pioneers — and remains home to […]