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The California Ranch is the oldest,
continually occupied farm or ranch in Spokane County, having been
settled around 1864. As the only established ranch along the Kentuck
Trail between the Palouse and Spokane Rivers in the 1860s, the ranch
also served as an important way station and resting place for hundreds
of miners, packers, and early settlers who passed through this region
throughout the frontier period. While the Ranch is frequently referred
to in the reminiscences of early travelers and settlers in Spokane
County, little information can be verified as to the exact year that it
was established or who the original owner was. The ranch was probably
started in the mid-1860s when the Kentuck Trail was marked out between
Walla Walla and the Spokane Bridge. The ranch later became the center of
the beef industry in the local area and was used for many years as a
stock yard where buyers could come to purchase beef from local
cattlemen. >Back to National Register Properties |
