SIERRA BUTTES |
Sierra County - Tahoe National Forest - 20N-12E-17
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September 28, 1914: "Ranger Walton says that the forest service intends to build a lookout station on the southwestern end of the Sierra buttes, and station a lookout there during the fire season next summer. A telephone line will be constructed from the station to Sierra City, and the lookout will thereby be enabled to keep in touch with the forest officers at all times. This work will be commenced as soon as possible so the station can be used next summer." (Sacramento Union)
May 19, 1915: "Supervisor Bigelow of the Tahoe National Forest is pleased with the increased allotment that the government has made for the reserve over which he presides. His total amount is $37,623, or $3000 more than previously. A standard lookout house will be built on the Sierra Buttes, and a telephone line will be constructed to connect this lookout with the present system. Other lookouts and telephone lines will also be installed. There will be forty-five officers in the forest reserve this year as against thirty-eight last year. Altogether there will be fifty-seven members of the force." (Sacramento Union)
May 27, 1915: "Forest Supervisor Bigelow has just received his allotment for the Tahoe National Forest for the fiscal year 1916, which begins July 1st. It calls for a total allotment of $37, 623. A standard lookout house will be built on the Sierra Buttes and a telephone line will be constructed to connect this lookout with the present Forest Service telephone system. A trail to this lookout will also be built." (Truckee Republican)
July 9, 1915: "Forest Ranger George King is now at Sierra City with a crew of eight men, and is engaged in constructing a telephone line to the Sierra Buttes Lookout. As soon as lumber can be taken to the lookout point a house will be constructed. Forest Guard H.H. Seymour, formerly of Grass Valley, will hold the position as lookout at this station.
From this lookout station Mt. Shasta and Mt. Lassen can be plainly seen. A good trail is being constructed to the top of the mountain, which will benefit the public greatly, as many people will no doubt visit the station during the summer to enjoy the wonderful view that can be obtained." (Morning Union)
July 19, 1915: "The crew building the telephone line from the forest service line at Sardine Flat to the Sierra Buttes lookout station is making good headway. Last week they put up four miles of wire in a day, said to be the record day's work for jobs of this kind in the mountains.
A telephone line will also be built from the Lavezzola ranch, near Downieville through the Butcher ranch country to connect with the Sierra Buttes lookout station, which will give an almost continuous forest service line throughout Sierra county.
The lumber for the building of the lookout station will be on the ground in a day or two, and the station will be constructed at once. All four sides of the house will be made of glass, each pane being 54 x 26 inches and extra heavy.
The construction work is in charge of Ranger George E. King of Goodyear Bar." (Sacramento Union)
September 3, 1916: "Forest Ranger Victor Halleck tells of a strange and thrilling experience during an electrical storm which occurred here a day or two ago. There is a lookout station on one of the peaks of the Sierra Buttes mountains. Overtopping the lookout station is a high shelf rock that is reached by means of a ladder.
Halleck climbed the ladder and was about to view what damage had been done by lightning when the storm broke again in all its fury. The ranger was afraid to attempt to descend while the storm was in progress and to save himself laid flat on the rock. The lightning broke off huge pieces from the jagged rock and hurled them into the canyon below, but Halleck was not struck or injured." (Sacramento Union)
Halleck climbed the ladder and was about to view what damage had been done by lightning when the storm broke again in all its fury. The ranger was afraid to attempt to descend while the storm was in progress and to save himself laid flat on the rock. The lightning broke off huge pieces from the jagged rock and hurled them into the canyon below, but Halleck was not struck or injured." (Sacramento Union)
July 7, 1920: "Miss Rena Tomola will serve as national forest lookout at the summit of Sierra buttes during the present summer. Miss Tomola ascended to her station on July 1. Women are employed as lookouts at several of the stations in this region." (San Francisco Chronicle)
August 29, 1926: "telephone messages received here today said that the town of Sierra City, Sierra County, was in imminent danger of destruction from a forest fire. All surface structures of the Sierra Buttes mine, owned by the Hayland Bro's of San Jose, have been burned.
The lookout station of the United States Forest Service near Sierra City is in danger, as is Sidney Gordon, the lookout, and his family, the messages said. A high wind prevails before which the fire is traveling speedily." (Modesto News-Herald)
December 23, 1926: "Mrs. Rena J. Wright, postmistress here since last January and widely known in Sierra County, died here Saturday, aged 35 years.
The deceased was for two seasons in charge of the isolated forest service fire lookout station on top of the Sierra Buttes. She was born in Loganville, near Sierra City, in 1891." (Plumas National-Bulletin)
The deceased was for two seasons in charge of the isolated forest service fire lookout station on top of the Sierra Buttes. She was born in Loganville, near Sierra City, in 1891." (Plumas National-Bulletin)
June 2, 1938: "Considerable damage was done to Tahoe National Forest telephone lines by winter storms. Forest Supervisor DeWitt Nelson reported Tuesday. Requests for maintenance funds are increasing as rangers follow the lines into the back country.
'In many places,' Nelson said, 'the lines are entirely down, poles broken, brackets and insulators torn off and the wire broken, causing practically a reconstruction job.'
N4elson reported that radio may have to be used on the Sierra Buttes lookout because deep snows in that region will probably prevent salvage work until July or August. Alternatives being considered are the construction of a new line or of an emergency line." (Nevada State Journal)
October 6, 1939: "It is refreshing to meet a man who is proud of his job and his record of last Sunday I spent one of the most enjoyable days I can recall with Sam Kasper, lookout on Sierra Buttes for the past five years, who has one of the most interesting and unique lookout points I have seen. It was a very pleasant two-mile hike on a comparatively easy grade and through pine trees to the lookout house under the Buttes where I had lunch with Sam. I noticed that everything he did, whether eating, talking, cooking, tec., was secondary and his eyes seemingly never left his territory and you could almost see them searching out every little canyon as they made the rounds.
The register showed approximately 200 visitors for this year but business was comparatively poor for some reason. I recognized the names of two couples who had made the point during the past two years and afterward been married. There must be "romance in the atmosphere" or Sam must be an emissary of Dan Cupid.
A ten-minute climb takes you to the pinnacle proper where a larger scope of the country can be observed. There is an alidade stand on the pinnacle and Sam is as brown as a berry after undergoing the wind and sun on this expanse of bare rock. It is proposed, by the way, to construct a shelter there this year. There are also tentative plans for constructing a steel stairway which will eliminate one of the main attractions in the climb and that is the white wooden ladder which constitutes one of the thrills that visitors remember. I can well understand that while the ascent was not so bad, my spinal column was doing the Big Apple on the descent. Sometime I want to get a picture of Sam"s pooch riding up the ladder on his shoulder. Only about ten feet from the alidade stand, one may peer over the edge of the rock and look straight down for a distance of 1500 feet. -G.M. Gwin - Tahoe -" (California Ranger)
August 30, 1940: "Experience in high-lead logging proved valuable to H.P.M. Birkinbine, Tahoe forest bridge engineer, in devising ways and means of getting construction materials to the top of Sierra Buttes for the building of a new lookout shelter there.
Materials could be packed by horse to a point about six hundred feet airline from the top of the buttes. From there the job looked almost hopeless. Birkinbine found someone with a small drum and five hundred feet of steel cable, a base was manufactured on which the drum was fastened then a transmission from an old automobile and lastly the gasoline engine disconnected from Birkinbine's concrete vibrator. The resulting power hoist is not listed in who's who of the equipment world, Birkinbine says, but he figured that it will whiz lumber and steel up the forty-five degree highline just as they highlead immense logs to the mill in the North woods.
The steel and wood lookout shelter being constructed is to make habitable the summit of Sierra Buttes during weather which heretofore would drive the lookout man to the small building under the buttes where observation was not quite as good as on top.
Sam Kasper of Grass Valley has been the Sierra Buttes lookout man for the past six years. Recently his report on a fire in Nevada City reached the central dispatcher, E.M. Stone, just as the automatic fire alarm was ringing in the Nevada City fire house.
The new lookout shelter is being built under the Civilian Conservation Corp program and a spike camp has been established under the summit for the CCC enrollees who are working on the project. Paul Cloquet, expert in wood and steel construction, is in direct charge of the project under Engineer Birkinbine. Forest Supervisor Guerdon Ellis is planning to cooperate with Lieutenant Striclin, commanding officer of Hobart Mills CCC camp, from which camp the enrollees working on the project are detached, in promoting a public dedication of the lookout upon completion of the shelter.
Heretofore the lookout has been the mecca of several hundred interested sightseers in spite of the rather arduous and hazardous means of ascent. With improved foot trail and improved ladder from the base of the rock to the top Ellis believes that many people will be interested in making the hike to the summit after the public dedication at the CCC spike camp." (Reno Evening Gazette)
Materials could be packed by horse to a point about six hundred feet airline from the top of the buttes. From there the job looked almost hopeless. Birkinbine found someone with a small drum and five hundred feet of steel cable, a base was manufactured on which the drum was fastened then a transmission from an old automobile and lastly the gasoline engine disconnected from Birkinbine's concrete vibrator. The resulting power hoist is not listed in who's who of the equipment world, Birkinbine says, but he figured that it will whiz lumber and steel up the forty-five degree highline just as they highlead immense logs to the mill in the North woods.
The steel and wood lookout shelter being constructed is to make habitable the summit of Sierra Buttes during weather which heretofore would drive the lookout man to the small building under the buttes where observation was not quite as good as on top.
Sam Kasper of Grass Valley has been the Sierra Buttes lookout man for the past six years. Recently his report on a fire in Nevada City reached the central dispatcher, E.M. Stone, just as the automatic fire alarm was ringing in the Nevada City fire house.
The new lookout shelter is being built under the Civilian Conservation Corp program and a spike camp has been established under the summit for the CCC enrollees who are working on the project. Paul Cloquet, expert in wood and steel construction, is in direct charge of the project under Engineer Birkinbine. Forest Supervisor Guerdon Ellis is planning to cooperate with Lieutenant Striclin, commanding officer of Hobart Mills CCC camp, from which camp the enrollees working on the project are detached, in promoting a public dedication of the lookout upon completion of the shelter.
Heretofore the lookout has been the mecca of several hundred interested sightseers in spite of the rather arduous and hazardous means of ascent. With improved foot trail and improved ladder from the base of the rock to the top Ellis believes that many people will be interested in making the hike to the summit after the public dedication at the CCC spike camp." (Reno Evening Gazette)
September 24, 1954: "The fire broke out in a steep, rocky section of the Tahoe National Forest, about two miles northwest of here yesterday afternoon. Although the exact cause had not been determined, a forest service spokesman said it was 'man-made.'
By 1 p.m. today, it had blackened 2,000 acres, mostly in the region of Sierra Buttes.
Already known to be destroyed were an historic gold mine, the Colombo, which went into operation this year, and a storehouse for the Sierra Buttes fire lookout tower." (Oakland Tribune)
August 1, 1963: "Sealed Bids Will Be Received until 2:00 P.M., August 15, 1963 Pacific daylight saving time at the U. S. Forest Service, 630 Sansome Street, Room 546, San Francisco 11, California. For the construction of the Sierra Buttes lookout on the Tahoe National Forest. Sierra Buttes is located about 4 miles north of Sierra City, California. Plans and specifications may be obtained from the San Francisco address for a deposit of $25.00 per set, or viewed only at the office of the Forest Supervisor, Tahoe National Forest, Nevada City, California." (Nevada State Journal)
July 18, 1968: "Dan Erickson visited the Sierra Buttes on Wednesday to do some photography and sketching. He took the road to the lookout via Sierra City. The last two miles to the lookout is now designated as a jeep road and is negotiable only by jeep. It is in the roughest condition Erickson has ever seen it." (Portola Reporter)
