Modoc National Forest

In 1945 William S. Brown Sr., an information specialist for the Californa Region of the United States Forest Service, compiled a History of the Modoc National Forest. -( The history page has been removed for updating - we hope to have it replaced very soon.)

Introduction

Introduction - Modoc National Forest in northeast California is a land of rugged beauty, a land of "burnt out fires" according to its Indian occupants. The Pit River valley, the lake basins, the mountains and the high plateau have attracted a variety of peoples and cultures to this area.

For nearly 10,000 years people have lived on these lands and have adapted to its environment. In order to understand the patterns of the lives of these people, heritage resource managers study the relationships between people, their cultures and the Forest environment.

By carefully studying the bits and pieces of the materials left behind by these peoples in the sites where they lived and where they used the land and its resources, archaeologists can begin piecing together and interpreting the great unwritten story that lies on and within the ground. If these fragile sites are disturbed in any way, valuable information is lost forever-and another page of that unwritten history book is gone.

Native American Use - The ethnographic territories of three different Native American groups lie within the boundaries of the Modoc National Forest. These groups are the Modoc, the Achomawi (Pit River) and Northern Paiute.

All three groups, and their earlier predecessors, used and depended upon a variety of resources in the Forest. The rivers, streams and lakes provided abundant runs of suckers and the water lily-wokas; the Devil's Garden plateau provided epos and other plan foods, in addition to deer, antelope and other game; the mountains and highlands offered other plants for food, basketry and medicines. Abundant obsidian sources provided a wealth of glassy stone for tools and for trade.

Members of these groups continue to practice many of their traditional ways Contemporary Native American use of the Forest includes spiritual guests and the gathering of food, medicinal, and basketry materials.

Exploration andSettlement - Hudson's Bay Company fur brigades led by Peter Skene Ogden passed through this area in 1926-1827 and 1830, and under John Work in 1832, trapping beaver and otter as they went. It is Ogden who gave the Pit River its name -- after the deep pits dug by the Indians to trap game.

The first emigrant party to venture through the area was 1843 consisting of 13 men on horseback lead by Joseph Chiles. In 1846, the brothers Jesse and Lindsey Applegate blazed an emigrant road from southern Oregon to the Oregon Trail at Ft. Hall, Idaho. In 1848 Peter Lassen followed this route to Goose Lake and then broke off to the south blazing the Lassen Trail. Assisting Lassen in the final stretch was Peter Burnett and his axe-swinging Oregonians who had just carved out a road from southern Oregon off the Applegate Trail.

The U.S. Government sent explorer John C. Fremont through this area in 1846 and topographical engineers conducting surveys for possible railroad routes in 1849, 1854 and 1855. The Warner Mountains are named for Captain William Warner, killed in the area in 1849.

The first Euroamerican settlers came to Surprise Valley in 1846 and by 1871 most valleys in Modoc County were settled. Hostilities with local Native Americans defending their land and life ways came to a head with the Modoc War of 1872-1873.

A group of Modocs, led by Captain Jack, and consisting of only 57 warriors, held off a large force of Army, volunteer militia and Indian scouts before ultimately being captured. During the conflict General E.R.S. Canby was killed, the only U.S. Army general killed during the Indian Wars.

Forest Established - Cattle ranchers and Basque sheepherders, like the Indians, turned the Modoc landscape to their favor. Ranchers raised hay in the fertile valleys and grazed cattle on the high mountain meadows and the vast Devil's Garden in the summer. Homesteaders utilized lumber cut from timber tracts by numerous small family run saw mills.

Overgrazing later prompted settlers to petition the U.S. Government to create the Warner Mountain and Modoc Forest Reserves in 1904 which later became the Modoc National Forest in 1908.

Mining also contributed to the local history in the Hayden Hill Mining District south of Big Valley in the late 19th century and the High Grade Mining District in the Warner Mountains in the early 20th century.

By the 1930s logging operations increased with logging railroads and company towns and camps like Tionesta and Long Bell Camp One. Also during this era young men enrolled in President Franklin Roosevelt's Civilian Conservation Corps which constructed roads and other improvements across the Forest. These men built lookouts like Sugar Hill and administrative structures, such as Patterson Guard Station , which are still in use.

Help Protect your American Heritage - On lands administered by the Forest Service it is unlawful to excavate, remove, disturb, deface, or destroy historic or prehistoric building, structure, ruin, site, artifact or object, or to collect, appropriate, excavate, damage, disturb or destroy historic or prehistoric artifacts.

Fort Bidwell in Surprise Valley was the site of a cavalry unit established in the 1860's to protect settlers against Indian attach.

Abandoned homesteads dot the Forest and represent the failed hopes and dreams of early settlers.

Happy Camp and Sugar Hill Lookouts offer splendid views and illustrate early Forest Service conservation history.

Stone circles, rock piles, and petroglyphs (Rock Art) , and other stone features speak for 10,000 years of native American occupation.

Basque tree carvings from the late 19th and early 20th centuries in mountain meadows.

A visit to the Modoc County Museum in Alturas will enrich your understanding of this land filled with lava lows, forested ranges, and wide open vistas.

Site of the Tule Lake Relocation Center in Newell illuminates a dark time in U.S. history when during WWII nearly 19,000 Japanese-Americans were forced to live there between 1942-1946.

As you travel across the Modoc National Forest this splendid heritage which dates back 10,000 years will unfold before you. The artifacts and structures you will see are irreplaceable page markers in time. Please help us perpetuate these chapters of our past so that future generations can share the experience with their children and all may continue to appreciate and learn from America's past.

History and Heritage Resources