In the 1800s, several routes for transportation were developed to link various towns in our region to each other and the outside world. Some of these routes have become well-established and traveled highways, while others have vanished into the country they once crossed.
One of these routes is now the Oroville-Quincy Highway. It had its beginnings in 1851 when Beckwourth blazed a trail along the ridge between the North and Middle Forks of the Feather River to the towns of Quincy, Bidwell Bar, and Marysville. Comprehensive in scope, this book covers the history of the road and surrounding area and provides a case study about how transportation routes evolved over time.
Dave Brown has done scholarly and exhaustive work, resulting in a book that describes how a pioneering transportation route has evolved over more than a century and a half, changing as needs of the users change and adjusting to competition from other routes. Written as a research project with citations, it is also designed to interest all readers wishing to know more about travel in the Feather River region of California.
Here as well is a case study for development of transportation routes throughout mountainous sections of the western United States between 1850 and the present. Techniques for dealing with rugged terrain and handling massive amounts of winter snow on the highway are considered in detail.
Among other aspects of the route's history discussed is the protracted debate about where California would build a highway to link the Oroville and Quincy areas. Above all, events and activities that lead to the road we see today are described, giving the reader a better understanding of how the past continues to shape the present.
The book is rich with maps, charts, and, most especially, historical photos.
The Oroville-Quincy Ridge Route by David Brown
Dave Brown is a fifth generation northern Californian who has worked as a counselor and care manager, primarily with senior citizens, since 1973. Taught by his father, Arch Brown, an automotive industry historian and freelance writer, to follow the links between past and present, he finds history research to be one of the best means to understand the present.
The author joined a car trip led by Florence Allen Norby — a great aunt by marriage - in the La Porte area when he was nine-years-old, thereby kindling a life-long interest in the region. Norby's deep knowledge of that section's history made it come alive with stories about each place as it was visited. Through the years since, the author has visited and learned to understand the experiences of earlier generations in the northern Sierra Nevada Mountains.
A long time resident of Butte County and past president of Butte County Historical Society and ANCHR, Dave has also been a property owner at Meadow Valley since 1978. The author wishes to share his knowledge of Oroville Quincy Ridge Route with others, including others with a bond to this beautiful and historically rich country.