Stone Turnpike Memorial Freeway - Shasta County, CA
Posted by: Groundspeak Premium Member NW_history_buff
N 40° 55.046 W 122° 23.888
10T E 550680 N 4529766
This historical marker located within the Lakehead Rest Area along the southbound side of Interstate 5 highlights a stretch of highway that was once U.S. Route 99, and before that, a very historical route known as 'Stones' Route' in the 1860s.
Waymark Code: WMGR5R
Location: California, United States
Date Posted: 04/03/2013
Published By:Groundspeak Premium Member TheBeanTeam
Views: 12

Travelers stopping for a quick break at the Lakehead Rest Area might notice a metal plaque imbedded on top of a boulder. This historical marker highlights this stretch of highway that was once an old travel route in the 1860s, then became the Pacific Highway in 1915, later turning into U.S. Route 99 and finally upgraded to Interstate 5 in the 1960s and known by this name today. This stretch of highway is formally known as the 'Stone Turnpike Memorial Freeway' named after the Stone family, who originally built stretches of this highway we now travel on today. The historical marker reads:

STONE TURNPIKE MEMORIAL FREEWAY

The Sacramento River Canyon
McCloud's Trail and
Stone's Turnpike Road

Until 1850, only a dangerous pack trail through the upper Sacramento River Canyon linked Oregon with California's northern mines. Yreka's merchants and settlers also wanted a safer wagon road.

The rugged terrain defied road building efforts until the Upper Soda Springs-Pitt River Turnpike Company built 44 miles of road from Upper Soda Springs (North Dunsmuir) to Stone's Pitt River Ferry (now under Lake Shasta).

Elias Stone, born in Pittsford, N.Y., founded his turnpike company with sons Norton, Willard, Lloyd, Marvin, and William plus kinsmen Edwin Stone and Pembroke Murray.

The road builders used men and animal power plus black powder to carve a road along canyon walls. Twenty-one log bridges were sited by block and tackle above all high water marks.

South from Soda Springs the road ran along the west bank via Dog Town, Hale's Ferry (Antlers), east over the ridge to McCloud River, then to Pitt River and Stone's Ferry. Another road lead to Shasta, 'Queen City of the Northern Mines'.

The fierce winter storms of 1860 washed out most of the road. Undaunted, the Stones in 1861 rebuilt their toll road but again they suffered setbacks as torrential rains again flooded the canyon.

The company struggled on with low tolls, high repair costs and legal problems. In 1868 new owners took over.

After 1870, uses of competing routes declined as freight teamsters, U.S. Mails and stage drivers used Stones' more direct road. In the 1880s, the Central Pacific laid rails to Oregon using some of the old Stone turnpike roadbeds.

Stones' route was later paved as the Pacific Highway. Upgraded, it became U.S. Highway 99, and in the 1960s, was rebuilt as Interstate 5.

In 1862, a Geological Survey leader enroute to Mount Shasta wrote: "... most picturesque road I have ever traveled. Sometimes down to the level of the river -- then crossing ridges, sinking into ravines -- sometimes a narrow way where two wagons cannot pass for half a mile ... the road is pretty well engineered ..."

William H. Brewer
UP and DOWN CALIFORNIA
1860 - 1864
1862 Map Courtesy Shasta Historical Society
Erected by Descendants of
Elias Stone & Deacon Simon Stone
1995

I also located an awesome website, cahighways.org, that has a paragraph written about this section of highway and reads:

The portion of Route 5 between the Pit River Bridge in Shasta County and the Shasta-Siskiyou County line is officially designated the "Stone Turnpike Memorial Freeway". In the decade of the Gold Rush, miners, farmers, and merchants of the Counties of Shasta and Siskiyou were unable to communicate with the outside world or bring their produce to market except over dangerous pack trails due to the rugged terrain in the Sacramento River Canyon. After other wagon road building efforts failed, Elias B. Stone and his sons secured a state franchise to build a wagon road. With brawn, black powder, mules, and oxen, the Stone family built nine bridges across the Sacramento River, 15 bridges across creeks and gulches, and a narrow road notched into the Sacramento River Canyon's walls, running 43 miles, from the Siskiyou-Shasta county line to the Stone family's ferry boat and landing on the Pit River, a few miles above that river' s junction with the Sacramento River. The Stone family completed the Stone Turnpike in the Sacramento River Canyon in 1861, but after only a few months of collecting tolls, disaster, in the form of the worst winter storm known in the area to that time, destroyed most of their work. The Stone family mortgaged all of its property and rebuilt a better toll road despite several legal entanglements. Other parties finally gained full control of the Stone family's company and the Stone Turnpike in 1868. In the 1870s, the Stone Turnpike became the major north to south stage route to Oregon; in 1887, the steel rails of the Central Pacific Railroad displaced the Stone Turnpike in some sections to complete the rail link into southern Oregon. In 1915, the dusty old stage road became Shasta County's part of the Pacific Highway, the predecessor of US 99, which is now I-5. Named by Assembly Concurrent Resolution No. 94, Chapter 98, in 1994.

State: California

Nearest City: Redding

Type: Marker or Milestone, historic in nature

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