Tag: Pine Ridge

  • Gene Van Dyne

    Gene Van Dyne

    Gene Van Dyne | Cressman Road

    9-9-22

    A Little History of Cressman Road from the 1940’s to the Creek Fire as told to Ari Arroyo

    Gene Van Dyne started coming up to the Shaver Lake area in the early 1940’s and moved to Lower Cressman Road in 1947 when he was 12 and his family purchased 160 acres covering the area roughly from 35822 Lower Cressman to the back gate at the end of Lower Cressman Road.   There was a small shop on the property at 35822 Lower Cressman Road and they added a small building for his father’s planer (he was a cabinet maker) and a small house where he lived until he joined the Air Force in 1954.  Over the years his family sold most of the land and he now owns and lives on 20 of those acres.  Gene and his mother built his present house at 36075 Lower Cressman Road.  Gene made the money to build the house by logging his property as well as his mother’s adjacent property.

    The question arises as to how the Van Dyne’s ended up on Cressman Road.  They were living in Fresno and every weekend his family came up to the mountains to camp in Woodchuck Country south of Wishon Reservoir and go fishing and hunting. In 1947 his family decided to move up to the mountain.  He does not recall how they found Cressman Road and when they got here in 1947 there was only a dirt road and the trees were so thick they were like a tunnel.  Lower Cressman was later paved using funds from the property owners in the mid 1980’s.

    There are so many stories.  Here are a few. Gene recalls when in 1948 there was so much snow that he and his brother made tunnels in the snow going from their house to the shop building. He would walk down to Peterson Road to get the bus to school at Sierra Elementary in Tollhouse and Sierra High.  When there was too much snow to go back and forth he would board with Hubert and Queenie Yelton in Tollhouse.  When he was in high school he and his father did the garbage pickup service for all of the Shaver Lake area in their 1937 Dodge truck.  He gave that old truck to Ari and Peter Arroyo and you can still see it at the bottom of their driveway on Lower Cressman Road.

    Gene joined the Air Force in 1954 and was stationed around the United States from Texas to California to Arizona, in Thule Greenland, Enewetak Atoll, Vietnam and Korea.  In 1955-1956 he was in the 55th Weather Squadron as a navigational equipment repairmen working on the B29’s and WB50’s at Enewetak Atoll when they were doing the first atom bomb testing.  He recalls being told to put their faces into their knees when the bombs went off and recalls seeing the red glow reflected through his knees. While Gene was in the Air Force, his father built a large cement dance floor, a bandstand and a concession stand for drinks and snacks behind their house.  They would have dances every week or so and the locals from Cressman community, Peterson Road, Auberry and other areas all came up to socialize.  Many would camp out and spend the night after the dances.

    Gene returned stateside in 1972 and was stationed at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, Texas where he met Royella at the NCO Club where she was decorating for Christmas.  To hear Gene and Royella tell their story, it was pretty much love at first sight.  Gene went to Korea in 1974 for one year which Royella says was the longest year of her life.  Since his return to the States in 1975 they have always been by each other’s side.

    Gene was stationed in Las Vegas until 1977 when he retired from the Air Force and returned to the mountain and to Lower Cressman Road . . . Gene was home!

    They spent the next 43 years living on the mountain in the summer and spending the winter months on the coast or in the Nevada desert and fishing at Lake Mead (Gene and Royella know all the best fishing spots).  To the delight of their neighbors and friends, in 2019 they stopped going away and have stayed on the mountain all year long.

    Gene has always been an integral part of the Pine Ridge community.  In 2008 Gene and eight other community members started the Pine Ridge Volunteer Fire Department and Gene was an engineer, firefighter and mechanic for the fire department.  He still works on the fire engines today as an auxiliary member.  He served for many years as road commissioner for the community, in charge of determining the needs and doing the work to keep the roads (which are not maintained by the county) in good shape.  Although he is not road commissioner anymore, he is always active in the work parties throughout the community.  Ari Arroyo recalled that when she came up to the mountain in 2010 she walked into her first Pine Ridge community meeting on the arm of Gene and was truly proud to be on the arm of who she then considered and still considers one of the most important people in the community.

    And then on September 4, 2020 the Creek Fire happened and Gene and Royella evacuated with their 1992 Airstream to the valley.  They were blessed that their home did not burn down but their old circular sawmill did.  When Royella learned about the sawmill she cried because it was so important to Gene and the whole community.  Though their home did not burn, there was immeasurable damage around their home and property but once they were able to return home they buckled down and got to work.  Now, two years later, they’re still working to get back to where they were before the fire but nonetheless, they are loving being back home!

  • India Saude McDonald

    India Saude McDonald

    India Saude McDonald | Pine Ridge

    9-24-22

    Growing up in the mountains is the best.  We climbed high up into the treetops, built forts, rode motorcycles to friends’ houses taking the backroads, collected and dried flowers, played at the lake for entire days, had intensely fast and steep sledding hills and appreciated feeling the seasons. It also meant that there was an ever present and very rational fear of forest fires.

    My first life-changing fire was in 1986.  I was nine years old.  My mother, my brother and I were in Fresno making a shopping trip.  As we were driving back home to Alder Springs, we could see a gigantic smoke cloud. We made plans for what to grab expecting to get home before being evacuated.  Our hearts took a massive hit when we got to the top of the Four Lane and Auberry Road was closed. Despite my mother’s most valiant pleading, they would not let us through. We talked about all the backroads that we could possibly use to sneak in and get to our house, but decided against doing that.  The thought of not being able to get our pets out was so painful.  A friend eventually was able to get in and rescued our pets while we stayed evacuated. Alder Springs survived that fire.  But, that intense worry of not being able to get home to grab just a few precious things and all the animals we adored really stuck.

    Labor Day 2020 was a chance to spend the weekend riding mountain bikes at Mammoth Mountain. It was nice to be able to travel and be outdoors for a change, after trying so hard to be careful and isolate through the middle of the COVID pandemic.  Everyone saw the picture of the little plume of smoke on social media.  I largely discounted it–it was close to Camp Sierra and there would be easily accessible roads for trucks to get to it. Surely with the town of Big Creek so obviously in its potential path, it would be easily and quickly extinguished.

    We stayed in Mammoth and rode bikes.  Then, on the afternoon of September 5th, a massive dark cloud of smoke rolled ominously over the mountain.  I wanted to go home then because I knew the sense of panic.  Nonetheless, we decided to stay one more night and drive home early Sunday morning.

    Mammoth is typically a five-hour drive over Tioga Pass, but it is only a twenty-one minute flight from Fresno airport to Mammoth Lakes airport.  In other words, the East side of the Sierras isn’t that far from home as the crow flies.  But we were driving home.   There was a lot of traffic on a notoriously busy holiday weekend through Yosemite. People from all over came to the mountains to camp, because many of the other vacation options had been unavailable, and were now also leaving the mountains.  And, the normal roads through North Fork to home were now closed…  We considered taking Highway 108 over Sonora Pass but that would take an extra 2-3 hours. So we took our chances at Tioga…  We didn’t have a reservation to pass through and our Auberry zip code wasn’t on the list of local zip codes that could pass through without a reservation.  Luckily the Park Ranger gave us a courtesy pass at the East side entrance when we explained how close the fire was to home and that we were likely to get evacuated soon.  I’m grateful for that kindness.

    The drive home was slow and the smoke was thick and forbidding through Yosemite valley. In Oakhurst the smoke thickened and made it so that the headlights on cars turned on automatically, sensing the darkness.  It was snowing ash.

    Traffic came to a complete stop on Highway 41 below Coarsegold, well before the Highway 41 and 145 crossing that we needed to turn off on.  Highway 41 was the only way out and everybody was getting out.  Sitting in traffic with the pressing urgency to get home was beyond frustrating.  It was that same feeling of panic about not being able to get home in time to save anything, especially the animals.

    We made it to our home with a few hours to pack and shuttle vehicles to park at my Uncle Norman’s house in Tollhouse.  We took pictures of what we left behind.  It is a weird evaluation that takes place in one’s mind when deciding what to pack and what to leave behind.  In retrospect we took very little.  We knew the sheriffs were coming to serve the mandatory evacuations that night and we left our little house on top of the hill on Tollhouse grade.

    Years before, my husband Steve McDonald purchased a large amount of used yellow firehose.  I question many of his purchases, but can really appreciate this now.  He left it attached to our water storage tank with a fire pump.

    That night we stayed with my in-laws Steven and Mikki McDonald in Sanger. They, too, were anxiously watching the fire as it approached the family’s cherished “Shaver Ranch” on Highway 168.  They had been successful in removing some of the historically valuable items from the Shaver Ranch but, like many, didn’t expect the fire to do what it did and so didn’t take as many items as we now wish.   The Shaver Ranch did not survive the fire.

    The Shaver Ranch is deep with history.  There was a post office, a blacksmith shop, a Victorian hotel at one time, an old three-hole golf course, among other things.  The property came through the family from C.B. Shaver and his daughter Lena and then on to Doug McDonald, my husband’s grandfather.  The property was used for big family events, family reunions, every major holiday, even for making apple cider from prohibition apple trees.  My sister in-law Jakki and her husband Jason Pucheu got engaged there.  Steve and I were married there by the meadow.  Cattle grazed there in the summer.  The family had a special tradition of getting a very tall Christmas tree by topping a tree (so that it could grow back) and then using a system of ropes to lower it onto a truck.

    The property is one of the most beautiful spots in all of the Sierra’s.  I absolutely loved living there.  If you were lucky enough to visit there, you know.  Actually, if you were just driving by, you could see the beauty.  The loss of the Shaver Ranch, the house, the trees, the history is the hardest.  Memories survive.

    I’ve never thought of myself as being dependent on, or spending too much time on, social media or my phone in general.  During the fire I think we all were glued to whatever source of information we could get.  Information coming out was accurate, inaccurate, implausible, disheartening, celebratory.  It didn’t matter, I felt like we all needed constant updates and news.  I saw a photo of the fire after it had come up out of Jose Basin and had destroyed Pine Ridge.  The fire  was starting to make its way the next day towards the Four Lane and down towards Linson Lane. I was positive our little house on the hill wouldn’t make it. The whole hill was covered in smoke.

    Then frantic phone calls came in to both myself and to my husband, Steve.  Sahara Saude-Bigelow was calling me and her husband, Frank Bigelow was calling Steve.  Frank works for CDF and was driving his work truck (not a water tender, just a regular truck) and decided to go by our house.  A McDonald family friend, Jose Rivera, who works for Fresno PD was patrolling the area for suspicious activity and decided to check in on our place.  They both arrived at the same time and saw that the flames were licking the shop!  A flare up of manzanita had created a hot spot.  Steve told Frank over the phone about the firehose hooked up to the water tank and the fire pump he left there.  Frank and Jose were able to put out the hot spot.  They saved our place.  I don’t know how to thank them, other than by saying “THANK YOU” in this story. As a result of this experience, I also am less inclined to be skeptical of the stuff my husband purchases.

    After the fire moved past our home but we were all still evacuated, we decided to spend some time with my family. We traveled to visit my mom– who was also evacuated and staying in Marin–with my brother and his family.  We, of course, rode mountain bikes there and then at Northstar in Tahoe. We had our cat and dog in the travel van with us. I think they thought it was an adventure.

    It seems like within just a few days Sierra Unified, where I teach, was already working to locate every family and ensure their safety.  It was the incredible work of the entire #Mountain Strong community, but I know personally that Alan Harris, Sean Osterberg and Melissa Rodriguez did what was still seemingly impossible.  They (the district) got hot spots, chromebooks, internet, and/or places to stay for every kid in our district.  EIGHTY percent of the student population was evacuated yet we were back to online learning within days.

    One of the bright spots in a very sad story has to be about my best friend Allyson Brooks and her family.  I grew up in the house next door to her in Alder Springs. Alder Springs didn’t make it out of the fire this time.  She lost so much: her home, her parent’s home and her father’s architectural office.  Just a year before, her father, Bob Brooks, the locally-famous architect and internationally-renowned cyclist had passed away.  The memories of her dad were embedded in that Alder Springs property.  The thoughts of rebuilding in Alder Springs were hopelessly gone. Then one of the first houses her father designed that was built up here came on the market and they bought it.  I can’t explain how fortunate and grateful she and her family are to live in that house now and to have that memory of her dad.

    After the fire, I think that deciding whether or not to rebuild has been a tough choice for people.   The McDonald’s are making progress towards rebuilding Shaver Ranch.  Steve has helped a number of friends with installing power poles, digging foundations, and helping in the construction of homes for those who are rebuilding.  Some people are already celebrating moving into their newly built homes. Others here have chosen not to rebuild– I can understand those decisions too.

    There is a difficult-to-describe emotion one feels, when there is no rationalizing why some homes burned and others didn’t.  I can’t give a precise account of the feeling I feel about why our house is here.  I’d gladly exchange my little house for someone else’s to have survived.  Someone called it “survivor’s remorse,”  I guess that comes kind of close.

    With the creation of the Central Sierra Resiliency Fund, another bright spot has been this agency that is associated with the Museum of the Sierra in Shaver.  The Fund was created by and is led today by an incredible group of people.  With their help, 46,000 trees have been replanted on the mountain so far. This storyteller’s effort to remember our experiences is underway.   I’m so proud of their work.

    Because of the Creek Fire the forest is forever changed.  So are we all.

  • The Gault Family

    The Gault Family

    The Gault Family| Pine Ridge

    April 2021

    by: Breanne Gault

    The Gault family has been a part of the Central Sierras for 70 years. It started with my father-in-law, Wayne Gault, who came to this area as a young boy with his parents. He attended Big Creek Elementary School in 1949 and 1950. His parents purchased a cabin in Shaver Lake to use as a vacation home. Wayne spent his teenage years in Newport, CA where he met Barbara. They would visit Shaver and decided they wanted to raise their family here. They welcomed Lance Gault, in 1973, soon after they purchased the family cabin. In 1977, they welcomed their second son, Dylan Gault. Their love for this area was instilled in my husband, Dylan and his brother Lance. They grew up hiking, backpacking and skiing. This mountain holds a dear place in their hearts.

    Both Lance and Dylan attended Pine Ridge Elementary School and Sierra High School and then went off to college. They both returned to our beautiful mountain community. Barbara and Wayne are still full-time residents in Shaver Lake. Wayne owns Blue Line Designs and is a local draftsman.

    I also spent a lot of time in Shaver growing up. My parents would bring my sister and I to Shaver to go camping and to go boating on the lake. My mom and her parents also spent a lot of time in Shaver when she was growing up. Shaver has a special place in all our hearts.

    Our family has grown as the years have gone on, Lance married Jennifer and they have four children, Andrew, Joshua, Jacob and Mia. Lance and his family reside in Clovis, CA and come to Shaver Lake as much as they can. Dylan and I married in 2010, we have two boys, Grayson and Zackary. We are educators in our community, Dylan teaches mathematics at Sierra High School and I teach at Pine Ridge Elementary School. We love that our boys are going to school where Dylan and his brother went, along with many children of childhood friends.

    In September 2019, Dylan and I found our dream home on the Ridge. It was the perfect place, close to family, friends and all of the adventures we enjoy as a family.

    September 4, 2020: This day was like any other day. Dylan I and got home from work and noticed a tiny plume of smoke from our back deck, which looked out towards Shaver. We had a nice evening, we went down to town and purchased some flowers to plant around our house.

    September 5, 2020: We received a phone call around 6:30am from my mother-in-law. She had heard news that there was a significant fire near Big Creek. It was a bit smokey at our house, but we didn’t think much of it. We spent the day doing chores, planting our flowers that we purchased the night before, cleaning the house and doing laundry. As the day went on, we got some updates from my mother-in-law, it was becoming a more serious situation. My brother and sister-in-law were heading up to Shaver help them pack up and evacuate. I was getting worried. As I completed laundry, I started packing some bags. Throughout the day we watched the plume of smoke get larger. I was making phone calls to friends to see what their plans were for evacuating. As night came, we had some family friends, along with my in-laws come to our house. They were evacuating from Shaver and headed to Clovis, for what we thought would be a couple of days. We all sat on our back deck watching the fire on the ridge above Shaver. It was glowing red. We could see the dozers trying to cut a fire line and we could see tress exploding. Once everyone left, we decided to gather our animals in case we needed to leave in a hurry in the middle of the night. I asked our boys (8 years old and 6 years old) to gather anything they would like to have from their bedrooms. We staged an area in our garage of things we needed to pack in the cars before we went to bed.

    September 6, 2020: We woke up around 6:00 am on Sunday, September 6th. It was so smokey, we could barely see. The smoke was filling our house even though the windows and doors were closed. It looked like it was snowing outside with all the ash that was falling. At this point, we decided we needed pack up and evacuate. The order was a voluntary evacuation at this point, but we decided it was best for our family to get down the hill to safety. I loaded my car with all we could fit along with our boys. Dylan decided he was going to finish getting the items on the deck put away and then he would meet us in Clovis at my brother- and sister-in-law’s house.

    As I drove away from our house, I was holding back the tears, trying to be brave for our boys. Our oldest asked “Mom, are we going to come back?” All that I could say was, “We can only think positive and know that we did all we could to protect our house. As long as we have each other and we are safe, that is all that matters.” As we made our way down the 4 lanes, there was a long line of cars and trucks at the bottom. I called Dylan and told him to go down Auberry Road to avoid the traffic.

    Once we got to Clovis, we felt better being with family and friends. Dylan, his brother Lance, a good friend and my father-in-law Wayne, had decided to go back to our property to cut more trees to hopefully direct the fire away from our house. They went back to our house mid-day and cut an additional 30-40 trees towards the bottom of our property in hopes that would be enough to help save our home.

    September 7, 2020: We woke up feeling tired and nervous, we had been watching the news and getting updates from many friends who work for Cal Fire. Dylan and his brother, Lance, decided to go back up to the Ridge to help one of our best friends, Ty Gillett, work on trees at Cressman’s General Store. They were trying their best to protect Cressman’s. Dylan, Lance, Ty, Chad and others worked all day to fall trees around Cressman’s.

    As we waited in Clovis for updates from them, we were also getting updates from our friends and from the news that the fire was progressing at a fast rate. News was that it would reach the Ridge and Cressman’s Gerneral Store by 1:30am. Many family and friends were surrounding us during this time, what an amazing gift to be surrounded by such love and support. It was around 9:45 pm when I got a phone call from my husband. All Dylan said was, “It’s all gone!” I couldn’t comprehend what he was saying. The fire had come several hours earlier than expected. How could this be? He then sent me a video from the Vista Point on the 4 lanes. It was unbelievable.

    Dylan told me that they were joined by a Cal Fire Crew. They had asked the crew if they could stay and help. They were partnered with a firefighter to help fight the fire. They were also instructed that if they heard the horn blare, they had to get out immediately. The flames they saw at Cressman’s were 200 feet tall and the embers being thrown from the fire were huge. Dylan said he could feel the “fire breathing”. The fire fighters along with Dylan and our friends had NEVER seen anything like this before. When Dylan got back down to Clovis, the look on his face said it all. Based on what he had seen, he believed everything on the Ridge was gone. That night was the longest night ever. We slept for about 1 hour. We were staying with Dylan’s best friend from high school, Alex Magallon, and his family. Alex and his wife Erika spent most of the night talking with us and helping sort through all of our thoughts.

    September 8, 2020: Still surrounded by family and friends, we were waiting to hear the official status of our home. We were sitting around, chatting and watching the kids play. It was just after lunch we when received a phone call and then a text message photo to let us know our house was gone. It is all a blur, but we will never forget the moment we saw our house flattened and parts still on fire.

    As the days passed, we waited to hear about our friends and their houses. We continued to watch the news for updates on the fire. The days were a mix of emotions, happiness for those who had their homes survive and sadness for those who did lose their homes. As things began to settle, we found out that the town of Shaver Lake made it, along with our school, Pine Ridge. These were definitely little victories.

    Being with family and friends going through the same thing was such a source of strength. We were there to lean on each other, mourn the losses and celebrate the little wins. Every single home still standing was a beacon of light, giving us a reason and guiding us to get back to our beloved mountain.

    October 2020-Present: The support from so many really touched us. It has shown us how big the hearts of our community is and it has taught us and our children what it is like to help and serve others. Such wonderful life lessons come from such a terrible situation. The most important thing is that we are all safe, healthy and together, and together we can do anything.

    The work has begun and will continue. We are working on rebuilding. Rebuilding our home, our community, and our beloved forest. The life lessons that we have learned and that we are teaching our children, are going to be lessons that will shape who they will become. During this process we are looking for and celebrating the silver linings in it all. Some silver linings:

    – My father in law, Wayne Gault, is designing our dream home
    – As a mom, my heart is happy that our boys are old enough to help with the rebuilding process and they are still young enough to have many years to make memories in our new home
    – We have some of our best friends helping build our new home
    – Through this all, we are stronger; a stronger family and community.
    – We are embracing the new adventure
    – We are Mountain STRONG

    “Keep your face towards the sunshine and shadows will fall behind you.” – Walt Whitman

  • Joe

    Joe

    Joe | Pine Ridge

    9- 5- 22

    Baptized In Fire: Recollections Of A Volunteer Firefighter

    Monday, September 7th 2020, 3:30 PM: As flames raced south across Jose Basin, very few residents remained on Cressman Road before evacuating. Those of us left were either scrambling to pack up the last of our irreplaceable items or trying to prepare properties for the inevitable. A wall of flames two hundred plus feet tall was consuming the forest we loved at an inconceivable rate, leaving behind it a kind of destruction rarely seen in history. It was time to abandon ship, and not a second too soon, witnessing the orange glow of an incoming monster obscured by smoke.

    For me the story begins five months earlier in April of 2020; an emerging pandemic that rocked civilization had showed some of us that there should be more to life than the hustle and bustle of city life. I decided to ditch my longtime residency on the central coast of California and attempt to make my way to the Sierra Nevada range. Few places in the state stood out as somewhere I could grow roots; Shaver Lake was at the top of my shortlist due to familiarity and recreational opportunity. With no time to waste, I quickly headed up to view potential properties that fit the bill. One of them stood out from the rest, nestled in the close-knit community of Pine Ridge. A modest yet inviting home sitting on five beautiful acres, it was the rural homestead dream realized.

    Shortly after moving in I joined the local fire department, Pine Ridge Volunteer Fire Department (PRVFD). A small band of kind and hardworking residents, it became a second family immediately. Having only a few fire behavior college courses under my belt I was eager to train and gain useable knowledge in wildland firefighting techniques, knowing in the back of my head that a time might come to use these skills. Yet I could never have predicted how soon that day would arrive or the way it may unfold.

    Following the loss of 75 percent of our neighborhood, there was barely an instant to digest the news as it was time to step up to the duties bestowed on the few of us firefighters able to activate. A handful of PRVFD members, myself included, returned to the mountains two days after the initial fire front had raged across the landscape and left it nearly unrecognizable. Handed my first radio, myself having no idea how to use it, our chief laid out the game plan.

    The main jobs for the unforeseeable future were to support incoming firefighting personal and protect the surviving structures of our community. There was also the austere task of assessing all the destroyed properties of neighbors, most of who were unaware the full extent of the damage. This was an especially daunting task, having just moved there three months earlier and not knowing my way around our roads. With potential for fire flare-ups at any moment that could block exits and become deadly, we took on the morose mission of documenting and photographing each address to forward the information to distraught owners.

    Of the remaining homes and outbuildings in our “green bubble,” some areas were too dangerous to protect due to thick unburned fuel and no alternative egress. We focused on supplying water to the myriad of engines working to suppress the remaining flames, meanwhile hunting down spot fires with potential to crown out and force another evacuation. For nearly two weeks it was unsafe to sleep on the mountain with the threat of another large burn in these “green and black” zones. I would work all day and into night before heading down the hill to a friend’s house in Auberry. His family had evacuated as well but not left a spare key so camping out on their porch was the only option, and not a particularly bad one for an outdoorsman like myself. It was still technically archery hunting season so sleeping under the stars felt natural anyway, except the stars were nowhere to be found in the thick smoky haze.

    Within a few weeks, with the fire still creeping around, a few volunteers were able to move back into one of our houses that survived. This helped us provide around the clock support for the fire crews still working in our area and gave us a place for to rest between shifts. However, we remained ready to evacuate had the fire picked back up into the surrounding canopy. Constantly battling continuing ground fire, we stayed at the property until the end of mandatory evacuation. I was then able to purchase a used travel trailer to park on my own property. It was a place to call home once again; a welcome relief and essential measure to begin the extensive cleanup, rebuilding and reforestation process.

    Having fought the fire for over a month, I returned to work and attempted to gain normalcy in my daily routine. Staying vigilant and living amidst the wreckage of our community was really the only option for me. There was no emergency rental clause in my fire insurance policy and I also preferred to be on site for the purpose of logging all the dead trees. There was much to be done going forward and no time to waste. Winter came in late November with Thanksgiving snow extinguishing all but the most stubborn of smoldering stumps and hollow trees. Armed with some essential snow gear saved from the flames, I spent plenty of days at China Peak during the ski season, clearing my head of the past fall and focusing on the future.

    Spring and summer finally came around so it was time to clear more hazard trees to prepare for the eventual rebuild of my house and planting of seedlings. By fall of 2021 cement was being poured after all the building plans and permits were approved. Just having a slab going into the next winter was reason to celebrate, but framing and all construction would have to wait until 2022. Beginning again mid-April, things have moved along at a desperate pace, in hopes to complete and move into a home before yet another winter. I feel so fortunate to have lived up on the mountain nearly the entire time since the fire, with many other neighbors having to relocate to less elevated locations. I am blessed to have had fire insurance and very helpful adjusters striving to get the absolute most from the limited coverage. I know it has been an ongoing fight for many others with insurance companies, and horribly devastating for those without insurance. My heart goes out to all affected.

    The story doesn’t end there, it will continue throughout the rebuilding process and into the rest of our lifetimes, shared with anyone interested and through this Storyteller program. I would like to thank all the organizations, clubs, businesses and individuals who stepped up to provide assistance in any and every way possible. Thanks also to the firefighters and law enforcement, local and from all over the country, that came to battle the blaze in our neck of the woods. The support from the whole entire community was essential to get survivors back on their feet, and help us to realize a way to conquer the monumental tasks laid before us. We remain mountain strong now and forever, and we will always be connected by the severe trials and tribulations of the Creek fire.

  • John Craycroft

    John Craycroft

    John Shaver Craycroft | Shaver Ranch, Pine Ridge

    8-25-22

    Shaver Ranch Memories

    October 2021

    The Shaver Ranch on Pine Ridge has been in the Shaver family for 100 years and was left in ashes by the Creek Fire one year ago. It is difficult to recognize.

    The devastation has removed landmarks, but there is the creek and meadow, the familiar curve of the highway, the rock wall, and the Shaver Ranch sign at the entrance.

    Across the road, moving charred branches and debris, there is the tarnished brass benchmark embedded in the boulder: “4,938 feet above sea level”.

    Yes, this is the place.

    From this boulder, most of the ranch can be seen, and without the thick foliage of trees, the contours of the surrounding mountains are more visible than before the fire. This idyllic meadow on Jose Creek, formerly surrounded by pines and cedars, is set in a small hanging valley between the crest of Pine Ridge and the San Joaquin River Canyon. Just a few hundred yards below the meadow, the creek plunges 3,000 feet down the steep mountainside through Jose Basin to the San Joaquin River.

    Because of the steep terrain on both sides, this narrow shelf in the mountains was found to be the only practical route from the foothills to the high mountain basins of Shaver and Huntington Lake and the headwaters of the South Fork of the San Joaquin. The trail of the indigenous Mono Tribe went through this area, and the makers of the original wagon road followed their lead.

    In August 1966, my father, Charles Burr Craycroft (generally called Burr), a grandson of Lena and Charles Burr Shaver, was on his final trip to the Shaver Ranch, where he had spent much of his youth. He wore his usual mountain attire, a red plaid Pendleton shirt, and the black Stetson hat which he inherited from his uncle Harvey Swift.  Standing at the entrance to the ranch, he pointed out the rock with the benchmark across the road near the old barn. Walking over and lingering there in the shade of a Black Oak, he recounted “Grandma Shaver’s” stories of the early days in these mountains and how this came to be the Shaver Ranch.

    Lena Shaver has not been mentioned a great deal in the history books. Yet, she was a remarkable individual who, as well as founding the Shaver Ranch, played an important role in the Fresno Flume and Irrigation Co. and the early development of the Pine Ridge & Shaver community. Strong and forthright, Lena had good business sense and was a close confidant and advisor to her husband. Her pragmatic nature balanced his idealism.

    Lena was 29 when she made her first trip up the Toll House Grade on a wagon led by oxen. It was July 4, 1893, Independence Day. She and her young daughters Grace and Ethel were on the last leg of the week-long trip from Michigan to reunite the family. Charles Burr (C.B.) Shaver had spent most of the previous two years with his partner Lewis P (L.P.) Swift here on Pine Ridge, as they supervised the construction of a new venture, The Fresno Flume and Irrigation Company.  The teamster driving Lena’s wagon surely would have stopped to rest and water the weary oxen at Kenyon’s store, which stood where the gate of Shaver Ranch is today. It was an oasis after the trip up the grade.  Little did Lena know that this would become her beloved mountain home one day.

    Though this was a big change from their comfortable life in Blanchard, Michigan, the scene here was likely reminiscent of Lena’s childhood. She was born in a small community called Cedar River in the woods of Pennsylvania. Like the Shavers and Swifts, Lena’s family, the Roberts were small family farmers who moved west to Michigan in the 1870s to try to take advantage of a lumber boom in the pine forests. Now the next generation was packing up and heading west again, a big move.

    The family settled into a cabin in the lumber camp, which would later turn into the town called Shaver. By the end of the season in 1893, the mill and flume were complete and ready to go into full production the next spring.  In Fresno, Lena practiced the intricacies of Victorian etiquette so they could properly entertain business associates and financial backers in the expected fashion of the day. Back at Shaver in the spring, the social life was more relaxed, with financial backers, management, crew, surveyors, engineers, and forest rangers often meeting on the cabin’s porch, on a granite boulder, or around a campfire.

    These were happy years for the family, and they welcomed their third daughter, Doris, in 1897.  By the turn of the century, the company was in full swing.

    Meanwhile down the road at Pine Ridge, the community was growing and becoming a tourist destination.  The Kenyon family’s store was prospering and a blacksmith shop, a small schoolhouse, and the Pine Ridge Post Office were added.  They needed more room for guests, so they built a “real” hotel, with the current Victorian style and finishes, not the typical rough mountain building. It had to be painted and have smooth siding, trim, and moldings with shingle roofing, not rough shakes.  These materials were not available in the mountains and would have to be brought up the grade from the valley, which was an expensive proposition. So Sam Jennings, the Kenyon’s son-in-law, rigged up machinery and used all local lumber to produce what they needed. In 1903 John Armstrong bought the operation and continued to run the store and hotel and they raised apples, pears, and cattle.

    The mill business continued to grow, but in 1901 LP Swift died suddenly of a heart attack, and his brother Harvey, who was married to Lena’s sister Minnie, came out from Michigan to take over his brother’s role. About this time, CB was diagnosed with a severe form of diabetes. He took measures to improve his diet and stopped smoking, and was able to continue his active lifestyle for a time. But he became ill in late 1907 and, with his immune system weakened by diabetes,  passed away on Christmas Day.  He was just 52 and Lena 43. With CB’s untimely death, Lena became a director of the company. She worked closely with her brother-in-law Harvey Swift, who assumed C.B.’s role as president, along with Arthur Long, the vice president, and Charles Musick, secretary.  Together, they managed the business through some of its most productive years until they sold the company in 1912.

    Lena then embarked on a new career in real estate development and carried out one of C.B.’s unfulfilled dreams. She purchased a lot in downtown Fresno on the corner of Fulton and Merced Streets and built the Shaver Building, leasing the ground floor to retail stores and the second to the Sierra Hotel. And then Lena and her son-in-law, Dr. Harry Craycroft, purchased 160 acres on the slopes of Stevenson Mountain and created the development they named Rock Haven. The name was a play on words of one of the towns from her childhood, Lock Haven, Pennsylvania. Lena then negotiated with the Edison Company to have the company dismantle her cabin piece by piece and rebuild it at Rock Haven.

    The idea of the Shaver Ranch was born in 1921 when Lena and Harry purchased the Armstrong’s Resort as an investment, and operated as the Pine Ridge Tavern. The business was very popular in the “Roaring 20’s”, attracting people from far and wide. The rooms in the hotel were $4/day, cabins $21/week and there were 40 acres of campgrounds and camping was free!  Unfortunately, in 1930 with the start of the Great Depression, the tourist business slowed to a trickle and they were forced to close the hotel.

    They stopped taking in guests and the property became the family ranch and the old hotel became their mountain home. Lena had loved her cabin at Rock Haven, but she enjoyed the comings and goings of travelers and running the store and post office until the building burned in the mid ’30s.  And here there was plenty of room for the entire growing family and Lena’s sister, Minnie Swift, built her own cabin on the slope above the home. They all spent many happy times here. The family took part in the work around the ranch during summers and weekends. There was always plenty to do, tending to the horses, gathering firewood, clearing dead trees, planting new ones, building, mending fences, and checking on the finicky spring box. It was a magical place, full of artifacts and memories.

    In Lena’s later years, Burr arranged for a young woman from Kingsburg named Adeline Nord to be his grandmother’s companion during the summer in the mountains. Adeline became a close family friend and later would glow as she recounted her times with “Mrs. Shaver,” driving her about, listening to her stories, and learning about the mountains. That summer, Lena passed a torch to Adeline, who herself became a mountain legend. Adeline would later marry Karl Smith and purchase and run the Diamond D Ranch at Blaney Meadows, above Florence Lake, now called Muir Trail Ranch. In the winters, she taught school in Auberry and returned to the ranch each summer, running the operation with her daughter and granddaughter for many years after Karl’s passing.

    Though Lena had always hoped to spend her final days at her mountain home, to her great sorrow, the doctors advised against her going to a higher elevation. She died peacefully at her home in Fresno in May 1939, a week after her 75th birthday.

    In establishing the Shaver Ranch, a place was established where the entire family—Lena’s three daughters, seven grandchildren, and sixteen great-grandchildren—could gather, call home when far away, and return as often as needed.  And this legacy continues to provide inspiration for the following generations.

    In 1963, the grand old house caught fire, likely due to an aging electrical system, and the old dry wood quickly burned to the ground. A collection of antiques and historical memorabilia worthy of a museum was lost. Fortunately, some photos and documents had been distributed for safekeeping or copied through the years. Douglas McDonald, son of Lena and CB’s daughter Doris, replaced the old home with a fine new one of his own, a mountain lodge.

    Now, this home has been taken by the Creek Fire, along with many others and thousands of acres of forest. Despite the land being laid bare, there is something of the spirit of those who came before here, evoking their dreams and accomplishments. And at the top of the meadow, a group of trees survives. Others, partially blackened, are leafing out along with many shrubs. It will take time, a long time. But it will grow back.

    Steven McDonald, son of Douglas, and his family have put the Shaver Ranch sign back in place above the entrance gate, standing proud. A welcome sight after the shock of seeing it on national news, hanging there in the wake of the Creek Fire. The difficult tasks of cleanup and erosion control are underway. Seedlings are being planted. Plans are being drawn. The first steps.

    John Shaver Craycroft

  • Ed Hanson

    Ed Hanson

    Ed Hanson |Pine Ridge

    5-3-22

    Shaver Lake and Creek Fire Reminiscence

    We had long yearned to have our own slice of heaven in the Sierras.  A place where we could create a homestead, raise our two kids, and enjoy our lives under the canopies of the large sugar pines, firs, and cedars.  We searched for many years until we found our place in 2007.  Located on Pine Ridge near Cressman Road, it had the space and rural atmosphere we were seeking as well as comradery of the neighbors of a wonderful community.  The property was unestablished, without buildings, water, or electricity.  There was a thick forest of trees, not far from highway 168, very private, and perfect.

    We spent most weekends visiting the property and working on it to clear brush, establish a well, electricity, septic, and plan every detail of our dream home.  We had a five-year plan to begin construction of our “forever” home.  After what seemed like hundreds of revisions to draft sketches, we finally settled on our perfect design.  Not too big and not too small.  A log home with a walkout basement/garage.

    In 2011, we added two more children to our family and broke ground on the house structure itself.  The foundation and walk out basement/garage went up quickly and there was a long delay of little progress until November of 2012 when the logs for the house finally arrived.

    That was when the community fun really began for us.  Many neighbors and friends arrived to help erect the log home.  Big tools, a junky old crane, and hard work by everyone that came by were typical days to come.  The process of stacking the logs went on for a few months because the snow came in shortly after the log arrival.  It took nearly as much time shoveling snow as it did to fit all the logs in place.  For the next couple of years of weekend construction, it was common for friends or neighbors to show up just to lend a hand.  We will forever be grateful to them for that. It really showed us how special and wonderful this tight knit community is.

    The home was completed in 2014, and we moved in that June.  We added another child in 2015 and I joined the Pine Ridge Volunteer Fire Department in 2016.  Fire seasons were becoming more and more intense.  We could only hope that we would be ready for it when it did.  The extended drought that followed had opened a path for the bark beetles to overwhelm the already weakened trees.  We lost over 300 trees on our small acreage and it thinned our forest to an extreme.  Most of the felled trees were over 100 years old.  I found use in the dead trees after purchasing a small sawmill and turning the logs into large timber posts and beams.  I had a vision of building a grand timber framed barn.  That was going to be the next large project, but the Creek Fire in 2020 reduced the hundreds of milled timbers to ash along with everything else, including our beautiful home and forest.

    On the evening of Friday, September 4th, 2020, my wife came home from Fresno and told me there was a fire reported near the community of Big Creek.  That night we learned that the fire was out of control and heading toward that community.  People were evacuating.  On Saturday, I assisted some of our personnel from the PRVFD to ensure our equipment was ready if needed.  A pre-evacuation notice was issued for our community and an evacuation notice for the communities between us and Shaver.  The PRVFD was on standby awaiting the call to join the efforts.  We watched the massive plume of smoke off in the distance, about 11 miles by line of sight, making its own weather.  The wind was picking up and it seemed like the monster storm was drawing in all the air from the valley to feed it.

    My family packed up their most important things and went down to stay with extended family in Hanford, which allowed me to focus efforts on the community and certain work to come with the fire department.  At this point, I was still certain there was no way the fire would get to us, but even if it did our place would be fine.  It was built extremely fire conscious and had massive clearings in all directions.

    Early Sunday morning the evacuation notice came to the Cressman community.  The smoke was extremely thick.  Several of us from PRVFD assisted our community members with evacuation.  I spent a good part of the day ensuring our gear and trucks were all ready to go.  Later that evening when it got dark, I could clearly see the large orange glow from the top of our property and could only imagine what was going on in the communities up hill.  The wall of fire was only a couple of miles away at that point.  I had a large four-wheel drive federal fire engine, E268, in my driveway ready to go.  Eventually, I too needed to evacuate, but before I left, I went to each of my immediate neighbors’ houses, double checked how fire safe they left things, and headed out myself.  I ran into law enforcement on the way out.  The officer told me there was only one home that was left to evacuate and they weren’t leaving.  I guess they eventually did.

    Early Tuesday morning, information sources showed the fire had made its way through our neighborhood.  I entered the zone to see for myself and to provide any assistance where I could.  I saw no other tire tracks through the ash so I suspected I may have been the first to enter our neighborhood.  It was extremely smokey, I couldn’t see more than twenty feet, very much a warzone.  The road was littered with rocks, burning trees, and downed power lines so I had to park and make my way in on foot.  I found nothing but devastation and nearly every structure I came upon had been diminished to ashes, including our own home.  I met up with our fire chief, who had been working on the fire for several days by this point.  He was exhausted and had also just learned he had lost his home.  We drove up to the station in Shaver and it was very hard for us to make those phone calls to let our family, friends, and neighbors know the status of their homes.  Over the next several days, I returned to help ensure the active fire that remained in the area did not overtake the few remaining homes on Glenwood.  Others with the PRVFD stayed on for several weeks to ensure the fire in the community was controlled.

    This unfortunate event brought the community together in such an amazing way.  The charity and support from our extended community all the way through the Central Valley is something I couldn’t have ever imagined.  Now, over a year later, it is great to see some new homes in construction.  We plan to rebuild, but ours will take some time.

  • Elizabeth Taylor

    Elizabeth Taylor

    Elizabeth Taylor | Pine Ridge

    9-14-20

    Originally posted on Facebook

    I wish I had known to say goodbyeTo whisper words just one last timeTo thank the place that was my homeTo say goodbye, I wish I’d known.

    The boards that creaked beneath my feetAre gone for good and so are we…The house, our home, has turned to ash,And so I wish I could go back.But time moves on and so do we

    The fire came we had to leave.

    Goodbye my houseGoodbye my homeGoodbye the place my kids have known.Goodbye too late,Goodbye too soonGoodbye goodbye goodbye to you.