Fort Bragg's Library History The Kelley House Museum has been researching the growth and development of library services on the Mendocino Coast. This week the city of Fort Bragg gets the attention. An early view of the 1913 Fort Bragg Library on Main Street near Laurel Avenue. The building to the right was the Fort Bragg Commercial Bank, and is today’s “Town Hall.” (Courtesy Fort Bragg-Mendocino Coast [...]
Libraries Arrive on the Coast Looking at how libraries arrived on the Mendocino Coast is part of an on-going series exploring the growth of libraries. This week’s story is part two and is a peek into the importance of fraternal organizations and a bookmobile. Mendocino County’s popular bookmobile, c. 1950. (Courtesy David Frick) Fraternal organizations gave a sense of “family” to newcomers arriving on the coast. [...]
Today when coastal residents want to read a new best seller, or find a Book-On-CD to listen to while commuting, or search for a good books on bugs for a six year old, they can turn to the libraries in their local communities. (We’re pretending there is not a pandemic going on that limits access to library services and buildings.) Group photograph of the Kalevala Lodge [...]
A recent column explored the sources of names on the land from Needle Rock south to Caspar on the Mendocino Coast. This week’s column tells the story of place names from Pine Grove south to Gualala. Plan a road trip and find these interesting places. Detail from Mendocino County map showing he southern coast and the small towns and landings found there in 1902. (Map by [...]
Maps are a time trap for historians…just ask the folks at the Kelley House Museum. A map inspection can turn from a quick glance to an hour or more of in-depth inspection, often with the assistance of a magnifying lens. And what captures this author is the names on the land. For whom, and what, was a placed named, and what work took place there. Detail [...]
For any readers unclear about the concept of defensible space please read about the massive 1931 Comptche Fire and how people survived in the middle of a firestorm. It’s a good lesson on what saves lives. Mendocino County - Comptche fire - 1:30 p.m. September 22, 1931. (Charles R Clar, Fritz-Metcalf Collection, Bioscience & Natural Resources Library, UC Berkeley) On September 22, 1931, the easterly and [...]
Flaming log rafts? How does something already floating in the Pacific Ocean catch fire? Some true events in maritime shipping will always remain a mystery. For the last column in our series on log rafts comes this history tidbit from the August 9, 1941 Mendocino Beacon. Fort Bragg wharf on the left. Structure in the center is the slipway built to launch a log raft. “Radio [...]
In recent weeks, the Kelley House Calendar has focused on log rafts and the vessels pulling them. Log rafts were exactly what the term suggests, logs tied up with chains that were towed to a sawmill in a sunny location where sunshine could dry out fresh cut boards. Practiced from 1906 to 1942, rafts became the cheapest way to move a lot of logs 1,000 miles [...]
This column is a further exploration into the history of log rafts on the Mendocino Coast and the topic will continue for the next few weeks. When a historian finds all kinds of interesting historical facts while researching, and it just won’t fit in one story, the topic becomes a series. Steam ship towing a log raft out of Noyo Harbor near Fort Bragg. (Virginia Lycan [...]
One of the dilemmas I get into as a historian is that I start out with an idea for a Kelley House column… “I’m going to write about tugboats and log rafts…” then when researching I get side-tracked and diverted by other interesting facts. Pretty soon I’ve got more than enough research for three or four columns, all relevant to my original search. So, if readers [...]