Shady Flat Cabin
About 80% of Sierra County sits on land that belongs to the United States Government, managed by the US Forest Service in the form of the Tahoe and Plumas National Forests.
But the National Forests, which were established in the Theodore Roosevelt administration in the early 20th century, have not always been there. Much of the early history of Sierra County, including the Gold Rush, occurred on land that was never formally deeded to its occupants and has instead fallen into the public trust.
What little remains of this history is fragile and subject to the whims of a harsh environment. Much of the northern Sierra is dotted with ghosts (not even ‘ghost towns’) of formerly busy mining encampments and even (for a while) thriving villages. Only a few of these – Downieville among them – have survived at all to the present day.
The View From Shady Flat
Shady Flat cabin, on a beautiful site about four miles up the Yuba River from Downieville, stands as a living reminder of what has preceded us in Sierra County. Now a part of Tahoe National Forest, the Shady Flat encampment was the site of active mines from the early days of the Gold Rush, playing host to miners who converged on the Yuba River from around the United States and beyond in search of quick riches, but ended up having to settle for the hardscrabble miner’s life so typical of the northern Sierra. But even as more remote northern mining camps such as Poker Flat passed into oblivion, Shady Flat remained a viable settlement well into the 20th century.
In the 1940s, as all mining activity subsided along the river and in its tributary canyons, the Shady Flat cabin was purchased by caricature artist Frank ‘Pancho’ Willmarth, who brought his wife and four young children from Los Angeles to live there. The family occupied the cabin year-round as a family into the 1960s, when the children went off to college.
'Like A Leaf Upon The Current Cast'
One of the Willmarth children, Katie Willmarth Green, has written a colorful and fact-filled history of Shady Flat and its illustrious neighbors, Like A Leaf Upon The Current Cast. This book is an excellent read for anyone with even a passing interest in Downieville and Sierra County. The ’spirits’ of Downieville and the Yuba River come alive in the pages of Ms. Green’s book.
In 2003, to avoid destruction by the Forest Service, the Shady Flat cabin was deeded to the Sierra County Arts Council for safekeeping. The Arts Council is currently working with the Forest Service to establish an appropriate vocation for the Shady Flat site, which will include an interpretative historical display covering that part of the Yuba, as well as a public arts facility for use by groups of local and visiting artists.
For more information about Like A Leaf Upon The Current Cast, please contact Katie Willmarth Green directly. For information about Shady Flat cabin, or to volunteer time and effort to preserve what remains of Gold Rush history and help develop this stunningly beautiful site into a public arts center, please contact the Arts Council.
An excerpt from Like A Leaf Upon The Current Cast:
…Annie [Perfield] was a weathered, chunky little lady, possibly in late middle age when we met her in the 1940s, it was hard to tell. She walked with a rolling gait and was obviously “strong as a little French pony” (as Pa Ingalls described his daughter Laura in the Little House books). She walked down [Jim Crow] canyon at intervals, usually alone, but on rare occasions with Charlie Raymond, to stock up on provisions in Downieville. For these outings she most always wore a flower print dress…
A news article in The Mountain Messenger for May 7, 1932 is consistent with the image I clung to in my youth about Annie. I thought of her as a Sierra version of “The Mighty Katinka”, and the comparison turned out to be pretty accurate. The paper tells how Mrs. Anna Perfield walked 14 miles through the snow to get to Downieville in time to vote for Herbert Hoover. It tells that she “lives at her mine at American Hill” and started out on foot despite being an “expert ski rider”. It continues:
Charlie Raymond and Annie Perfield
Leaving the high Henness Pass ridge, she attempted a short cut to the Comet Mine in the head of Jim Crow Canyon, but soon got into difficulties as soft snow was encountered. The winter pack was still from 12 to 15 feet, on top of which three feet of new snow had fallen.
But, being a hardy mountain woman, Mrs. Perfield fought her way on through the deep drifts until she finally reached the lower canyon, where the snow was not too deep. Making her way to a cabin which she has on another claim, the Nugget, and where bedding and supplies had been left, Mrs. Perfield found it in a wrecked condition, the work of vandals…
Tired and disheartened, Mrs. Perfield rested before proceeding on her long journey to Downieville to vote … determined to do her bit in returning President Hoover to office…
