French Corral - California Ghost Town

FRENCH CORRAL

NAME: French Corral
COUNTY: Nevada
ROADS: 2WD
GRID #(see map): 1
CLIMATE: Warm winter, mild summer
BEST TIME TO VISIT: Anytime.

COMMENTS: Just northeast of Grass Valley, Semi-ghost. French Corral, CA On Pleasant Valley Road about 1/2 way between Hwy 20 and Hwy 49 in western Nevada County. Semi ghost, occupied. Population 70. Hydraulic mining traces are only apparent historical interest. Mostly trailers and a few ranch houses. (last visited 7/4/2000)
REMAINS: A few original structures.

Equal to the wealth of the gold ridges is the treasure of history & romance that lies in the rugged San Juan Ridge. Not only from the pits of the long-deserted mines, the hundreds of miles of rotting flumes, overgrown, debris-filled ditches, and still more from the picturesque towns that are found along the mountain roads, does one get a sense of the comedy and tragedy that made up one of the most stirring periods in the great epic of California's mining era. Some of these cities of the past can claim about 100 inhabitants today, while others, far off the usual routes of travel, are mere ghosts, deserted, crumbling obliterated, and unmarked except for the inevitable diggings which are everywhere visible in spite of the smoothing over by the passage of time. Beginning at the lower tip of the ridge, the road passes thru French Corral, the 1st of the historic mining camps to spring up along the ancient San Juan River channel. There in 1849, the 1st settler, A Frenchman, built a corral for his mules. Very soon it was discovered that the locality was rich in placer gold, and a town quickly grew up on the site of the Frenchman's corral. Later, as hydraulic mining developed, French Creek became 2nd only to North San Juan in size & importance, numbering its population in the thousands. Now a village of only a few dozen people, French Corral retains a flavor of ro-mance in its historic landmarks. The office of the Milton Mining & Water Co., in which one terminus of the 1st long-distance telephone line was located, has long been torn down, but that site is marked. The brick walls of the old Wells Fargo Express office built in the 1850's and equipped with iron doors, and window shutters, which once guarded millions of dollars in gold against would-be robbers, look as though they could stand for generations to come. The former schoolhouse was used as a hotel in the 1850's; and a number of houses are still in use today. Submitted by Bob Stelow.	Wells Fargo -- 1854 Courtesy Dolores Steele Wells Fargo -- 1854 Courtesy Dolores Steele

Equal to the wealth of the gold ridges is the treasure of history & romance that lies in the rugged San Juan Ridge. Not only from the pits of the long-deserted mines, the hundreds of miles of rotting flumes, overgrown, debris-filled ditches, and still more from the picturesque towns that are found along the mountain roads, does one get a sense of the comedy and tragedy that made up one of the most stirring periods in the great epic of California's mining era. Some of these cities of the past can claim about 100 inhabitants today, while others, far off the usual routes of travel, are mere ghosts, deserted, crumbling obliterated, and unmarked except for the inevitable diggings which are everywhere visible in spite of the smoothing over by the passage of time. Beginning at the lower tip of the ridge, the road passes thru French Corral, the 1st of the historic mining camps to spring up along the ancient San Juan River channel. There in 1849, the 1st settler, A Frenchman, built a corral for his mules. Very soon it was discovered that the locality was rich in placer gold, and a town quickly grew up on the site of the Frenchman's corral. Later, as hydraulic mining developed, French Creek became 2nd only to North San Juan in size & importance, numbering its population in the thousands. Now a village of only a few dozen people, French Corral retains a flavor of ro-mance in its historic landmarks. The office of the Milton Mining & Water Co., in which one terminus of the 1st long-distance telephone line was located, has long been torn down, but that site is marked. The brick walls of the old Wells Fargo Express office built in the 1850's and equipped with iron doors, and window shutters, which once guarded millions of dollars in gold against would-be robbers, look as though they could stand for generations to come. The former schoolhouse was used as a hotel in the 1850's; and a number of houses are still in use today. Submitted by Bob Stelow.

Wells Fargo -- 1854
Courtesy Dolores Steele

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