Then And Now - Power Of The Earth

Water - a lot of it. 40 to 100 inches of rain fall each year on the north coast. Rivers swell and sometimes flood with devastating impact. Landslides destroy roads and rail lines. The ocean’s unrelenting force carves a rugged coastline and occasional tsunamis explode onto the land wiping out whole towns.

 

Cushing House at High Tide Crescent City - 1853

Crescent City was founded in 1853 as a shipping and trade center, supplying miners who had come to this northwestern coastal town after the discovery of gold on the Trinity River in 1848. When the Battery Point Lighthouse was completed in 1856, Crescent Bay opened up as an important harbor.

The area experienced a timber boom as Northern California grew throughout the second half o the 19th Century and locally produced lumber was brought to Crescent City for reshipment to San Francisco and other ports.

The topography of the sea floor near Crescent City and the town’s proximity to its bay has contributed to a series of damaging tsunamis in its history. Just since 1933, 32 tsunamis have been recorded, five of which caused damage, most notably the 1964 event.

Much of Front Street, the location of the Cushing House and Bay Hotel in the 1853 photograph, was obliterated by the 1964 tsunami. The concrete building that replaced it, the Surf Apartments, was built to withstand most any assault from the sea.

This pair of photos is located outside the boundaries of Redwood National and State Parks.

 

Left image
Credit: "Images of America: Crescent City & Del Norte County" Del Norte County Historical Society 2006 Arcadia Publishing

Right image
Credit: NPS/Ted Barone

 

Front Street Crescent City 4th of July - ca. 1857

On March 27, 1964, Anchorage, Alaska’s Good Friday earthquake, the largest ever recorded in North America measuring 9.2 on the Richter scale, shot waves down the coast. Four of them slammed into Crescent City, destroying hundreds of buildings and killing 12 people.

The first waves caused only minor flooding so residents weren’t too worried. However, shortly after the first waves, the water in the bay receded to ¾ of a mile from the shore. As the keepers for the Battery Point Lighthouse wrote, “We were looking down, as though from a high mountain, into a black abyss. It was a mystic labyrinth of caves, canyons, basins, and pits, undreamed of in the wildest of fantasies.” Then a wall of water, estimated to be 75-feet high, came crashing through the town.

When it was over, “The whole beachfront was a mass of destruction. Logs, boats, furniture, cars, along with buildings were tossed helter skelter.”

This pair of photos is located outside the boundaries of Redwood National and State Parks.

 

Left image
Credit: "Images of America: Crescent City & Del Norte County" Del Norte County Historical Society 2006 Arcadia Publishing

Right image
Credit: NPS/Ted Barone

 

Mattole Wharf - 1908

The Mattole Valley is just south of Cape Mendocino and historically very remote from the Redwood Empire communities of Ferndale, Fortuna, and Eureka. Until a long and winding road that could handle engine-powered trucks was built in 1919, the only commercially viable way in and out was by boat. The Mattole Wharf, built in 1908, was located on a particularly rough patch of the sea, buffeted by drifting logs and debris, heavy pounding waves, and strong currents. The road and railway that connected the wharf with the town of Petrolia was regularly damaged by floods and landslides. The wharf finally closed down for good in 1918.

This pair of photos is located outside the boundaries of Redwood National and State Parks.

 

Left image
Credit: Courtesy of Greg Rumney

Right image
Credit: NPS/Ted Barone

 

Downtown Klamath - 1939

The Christmas flood of 1964 that wiped out the town was part of a much bigger flood event that encompassed about 200,000 square miles (roughly the size of France), left thousands homeless, caused 47 deaths, and $540 million in damage. A series of atmospheric rivers battered areas in Oregon, Idaho, Washington, Nevada and Northern California, producing as much as 15 inches of rain in 24 hours.

This pair of photos is located outside the boundaries of Redwood National and State Parks.

 

Left image
Credit: "Images of America: Crescent City & Del Norte County" Del Norte County Historical Society 2006 Arcadia Publishing

Right image
Credit: NPS/Ted Barone

 

Douglas Memorial Bridge after the flood on the Klamath - 1964

The Douglas Memorial Bridge opened for traffic in 1926, driving the ferry near the mouth of the Klamath River out of business. It was named for Dr. Gustave H. Douglas, an important proponent of a bridge across the Klamath that would link Del Norte with the roads of Humboldt County and southward.During the massive flood of December, 1964, two sections on the south side of the bridge were battered by huge logs and the sheer force of the river’s current. They were washed away as was the northern approach and the town of Klamath.

This pair of photos is located within the boundaries of Redwood National and State Parks.

 

Left image
Credit: National Park Service Archives

Right image
Credit: NPS/Ted Barone

 

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