Whiskey Flat, California

Replace the modern cars with horses and buggies and you have the town of Whiskey Flat, now known as the new Kernville.

The California Gold Rush of 1849 bypassed this area of the Sierra Nevada.  Nothing of civilization showed on the maps of the day until 1860 when Lovely Rogers discovered a 42-ounce gold nugget.  (How one can call something weighing 42 ounces a "nugget" is beyond me!)  The Big Blue mine was begun and would be the leading producer of gold of all the mines to follow.

Mines require men to work them, and before you knew it entrepreneurs began to filter in, too.  Adam Hamilton set up his tent, threw a board across two whiskey barrels and thus began a saloon known as Whiskey Flat.  That's how towns were born back then - and it still lives today despite its first inhabitants suffering harsh winters, spring muds, searing summer heat, gunfights, and swindlers.  These were men of the real old west:  miners, outlaws, secessionists, and temperamental ranchers; no romance here. 

In 1883, a mining strike caused by miners not being paid resulted in the Big Blue being torched, and in 1892 there was a shoot out between two sets of brothers over a mining claim.  But still the town survived. 

So many folks had moved into the area by then, though, that the Native Americans were getting pushed around pretty good.  They had been peaceful, but the 1,700 Tubatulabal and Kawaiisu were now also pressured by nature.  The abundance of people living off the wildlife in the area caused their food supply to dwindle, and the winters had been extremely harsh of late.  They were also an agriculture based community and the drought didn't help their situation.  Cattle were rummaging in what crops they did manage to grow because they were hungry, too.  The Indians began stealing horses and rustling cattle.  Over the next two years 60 whites and 200 Indians would die because of the pressures men put on nature and each other.

Finally, in 1862, the cavalry moved into the area to try and get a handle on the problem.  They did, but not without terrible consequences...