If we go back to the pre-European history of the area, the land where the lake now stands was a broad meadow that would ultimately be named Big Meadows by settlers. The hapless Thomas Stoddard would bring them here, ultimately displacing the Mountain Maidu who had called this area home for generations.

In 1847, hoping to become an inland land baron the likes of Sacramento's John Sutter, Danish Peter Lassen built upon the work of preceding surveyists, creating his own route into California from the east which would -- by no coincidence -- lead weary travelers directly to his trading post.

It was upon this route that Stoddard traveled in 1849 to find himself in Big Meadows. While on a fruitless hunting expedition with a partner he became separated from the rest of his group and spent several days wandering the area vainly seeking his party.

According to the story he told when he appeared back in the relative civilization of the Downieville area in poor shape but laden with gold nuggets, he and his partner were still wandering about when they came across a lake whose shores were plentiful with gold just ripe for the plucking. Laden with all they could carry and exhausted, Stoddard and his partner rested only to be attacked by the local Indian population.

The tale picked up steam that winter and into the spring becoming the biggest piece of grist for the rumor mill among the northern California prospectors. Several parties looking to get a jump on the action attempted early winter crossings to find the fabled lake and were turned back by the weather, some with disastrous consequences.

The subsequent summer Stoddard hand-picked 25 men to follow him on an expedition back to the lake but a group numbering in the hundreds followed along looking to capitalize on the quick riches. When his expedition led to many lakes not matching the description his group provided an ultimatum: find the lake the following day or be hung and left for the birds.

Stoddard quietly took his leave of his expedition that evening instead.

Undeterred by the lack of a leader or reality, as many as 2000 miners spent the early part of that summer looking for the lake or being led up by unscrupulous guides who'd promise "on their life" to deliver them unto Gold Lake where fantastic takes were reported. While nobody ever found Stoddard's Gold Lake, many found great riches to be had in the surrounding areas.

This is where history starts feeding on itself.

Miners need lots of odd supplies, among them timber. Timber for shoring up mines, timber for making flumes in which to wash gold-carrying debris and so forth. Working alongside the miner was the lumberjack from nearly day one. Now, when the gold petered out, the lumber was still there and the infrastructure in place for shipping it other places it might be needed.

Loggers and their families need power and the area becomes dotted with a number of reservoirs. Throughout Northern California at this time businessmen started looking greedily at mountain meadow valleys, land with a water source and an easily pluggable egress and Big Meadows was no exception.

Julius M. Howells eyed Big Meadows and saw a massive reservoir made of the valley and brought his idea to Guy and Edwin Earl as well as Arthur Breed in the Bay Area. Enlisting the help of Augustus Bidwell (whose family name dots parts from here to Chico) Breed began buying purchase options from the farmers who populated Big Meadows, reassuring them that he was only doing so to resell the land at a profit later.

By 1902, Breed had purchased the entire valley but smelled trouble in the air. Howells and Bidwell were sent down the Feather River whereupon they found another group tacking up water appropriation notices along the riverbanks. Suspecting time was of the essence, the two raced the other team back towards Quincy to file their own appropriation papers, cutting the phone line just in case.

It turns out they were right -- the other group arrived at the court reporter 50 just minutes later.

The skulduggery wasn't quite done, however. First, eviction papers were served on the dairy farmers still in the valley. Eastern financiers were brought in to bankroll the purchase of other area power companies but still there was a fly in the ointment.

A hundred or so souls called Prattville home. The town was fairly well established and residents had no interest in selling out to the power barons.

That was, of course, until a mysterious fire swept through town on the Fourth of July 1910 while the residents were enjoying a citywide picnic a few miles from home.

The timber was cleared from the land -- 300 million board feet of it -- and in 1910 construction began in earnest on what would be the largest reservoir in North America. The construction was finished in February 1914 and soon flooded the meadow, the only trace of Prattville left being the relocated cemetery which you can still visit.

It took four years for the lake to completely fill up. Guy Earl named the lake "Almanor" after his daughters: Alice, Martha and Elinor.

Almanor has been a recreation destination since before Big Meadows was submerged underneath 1.3 million acre-feet of water. Back then a number of fishing camps dotted the area and signs of early lake development can be found down at Plumas Pines and in the intervening months between now and when Lassen View Resort becomes condos.

Materials for this history were gleaned from Plumas County: History Of The Feather River Region as well as this article from the Mountain Democrat's Richard Hughey.

Also interesting is a January 1999 article in Environmental History by Jessica Teisch puts Almanor's Genesis in context with other dams and the power rush in general and is pretty good reading.

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