Collection: Books and Periodicals

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Title: A Memorial and Biographical History of Northern California (1891) Collection Type: Books and Periodicals Publisher: Lewis Publishing Company Published: 1891 Copyright: In the public domain or published before 1925 Source(s): Google Books # of Pages: 713 Download PDF: User Login Required Download OCR Text: User Login Required

Date Scanned: 2024-07-22 00:25:09 Item Sourced From: PDF First Created: 2025-03-17 03:11:29 Last Updated: 2025-03-17 06:30:36

Original Held At: Searls Historical Library Location: 161 Nevada City Hwy, Nevada City, CA 95959

Page: of 713  

HISTORY OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. 115 more than one-half of the richest agricultural region of the county. Several of them have been somewhat subdivided by being leased out to tenants; but generally this is done in 500acre and 1,000-acre tracts. As population increases and the demand for small farms is made, there will be subdivision. It is now desired, but cannot come until population demands it. Land is plenty and resources of all kinds are plentiful; but it takes a share of capital, with a degree of industry and intelligence, to use the resources. Government lands are no more to be had. Cheap lands are not to be found eaeily. Good lands are abundant. [The State Mineralogist says that Butte is the only county in the State showing an almost equal importance in an agricultural and a mining point of view, as nearly every branch of agricniture is here represented ; so is every kind of gold-mining successfully pursued,—quartz, hydraulic, drift, and river bed operations being all successfully prosecuted, the latter on a large scale. The Big Bend Tunnel, constructed for draining the bed of the Feather River, is not only the largest enterprise of the kind in California, but the largest probably ever undertaken for a similar purpose. The operations of the Spring Valley Hydraulic Company, at Cherokee, in this county, are also among the largest now carried on in the State. In this locality, too, was picked up a majority of the more valuable diamonds found in California. In Butte, the pliocene river system, the principal sites of the drift mines, meets with its greatest development. This county has in the past been a large producer of the royal metal, and, to usea scriptural expression, “the gold of that land is good,” much of that obtained from the placer mines having ranged from 945 to 980 in fineness. Several of the useful minerals alsv occur in this county; some of them under conditions that promise to render them of much economic value. Coal, claimed to be of the Cannel variety, was discovered some years ago near Feather River. Having been but little opened, neither the extent of this deposit nor its value as a fuel has been ascertained. Near the same river has been found a bed of marble of close texture and variegated hue, but it aleo remains unopened, with not much known in regard to its value. Clays, suitable for making bricke, and perhaps those of a finer kind, are plentiful in Butte.] PRICES OF LANDS. These vary according to the quality of the land, distance from railroad and character of improvements from $10 to $250 per acre. In the immediate vicinity of Chico, where the land is sold in tive-acre lots, almost the same as town lots, and all of it very rich, the latter figure is obtained. No good land, however, can be had for less than $25 an acre anywhere within twelve miles of the railroad. But when it is considered what these lands will produce, and how many advantages of climate and social conditions are attached, the lands in Butte County are cheap at the above prices. PRODUCTIONS. All the grains and all the fruits common to the Temperate zone grow in Butte County in most luxuriant abundance. On Rancho Chico there is scarcely a fruit, shrub or flower known amongst men which has not been propagated successfully. The citrus fruits also are produced in great abundance, bearing heavy crops every year. Thies industry, however, is yet in its infancy. The apricot, that princess of early fruits, is one of our leading varieties, growing luxuriantly and bearing abundantly. Cherries are-grown in quantities and shipped to Portland, Oregon, and eastward as far as New York. We have fresh fruits continuously from the first of May, or sometimes earlier, until the last of January, all of home productiun. It is a most remarkable fact that the apple, which belongs in the north and the orange which belongs in the tropics, here grow side by side. Butte County deserves special credit for having originated the citrus fair, which has since been imitated in other parts of the State