City of Susanville history

Isaac Newton Roop was born in Carroll County, Maryland, on the thirteenth day of March 1822.

Lassen remained in Missouri until 1839, when he left the area with a small group going to Oregon.

In February 1845, Lassen’s Bosquejo Ranch was established there and it became the northernmost settlement in California, where he established Benton City.

As the discovery of gold in 1848 sparked a flow of westward migration, new settlers sought an alternative to the route through Donner Pass to cross the Sierra Mountain Range.

In May 1850, Lassen deeded over one-half of his ranch to Joel Palmer to finance the purchase of a small steamboat, Lady Washington.

In 1853, Isaac Roop constructed a cabin that became a trading post, and later, a fortification used during the Sagebrush War.

While traffic continued through the area, it would not be until 1854 when Isaac N. Roop and Company established a trading post at the west end of Honey Lake Valley.

In 1855, Lassen did find gold in the Honey Lake Valley.

In 1856 Roop established the short-lived “republic” of Nataqua and made Susanville its capital.

In the fall of 1858, news circulated of the silver discovery in the Black Rock Desert, Nevada.

The first legislature elected in this new territory met and organized in the town of Genoa, Carson Valley, on the fifteenth of December 1859.

Situated at 4,186 feet elevation along the Susan River on the northeastern corner of the Sierra Nevada, the city of Susanville has a unique and colorful history, established in the aftermath of an 1863 skirmish called the Sagebrush War.

In 1865 he was elected to the office of District Attorney for the County of Lassen, receiving the entire Democratic vote and nearly two thirds of the Republican vote.

Here he located the land upon which the city of Susanville now stands, built a sawmill near by, and continued to reside here up to the day of his death, February 14, 1869.

By 1880, settlements had sprung up all over Lassen County – Bieber, Hayden Hill, Toadtown, Madeline, Buntingville, and Paradise City to name a few – some of which no longer exist today.

More than 4,000 square miles (10,500 square km) of the desert lie below sea level, including the 300-square-mile (800-square-km) Salton Sea, a lake with no outlet that was created in 1905–07 when the nearby Colorado River broke out of its channel.

Most of eastern California is desert. Its largest towns are in the Owens Valley, which was a fertile farmland until its groundwater flow was diverted to Los Angeles through a mammoth series of conduits built in 1908–13.

Though the N-C-O railroad helped develop the high-desert region of eastern Lassen, it would be the Fernley & Lassen Railroad, built in 1913, that would tap the vast timber resources of the county's western region.

Susanville contains a community college established in 1925 and is a gateway to Lassen Volcanic National Park and Lassen National Forest (headquartered at Susanville). Plumas National Forest is also nearby.