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Other
Klamath
River Communities
Orleans
Seiad
Somes
Bar
The
Chamber
Meets Every Third Thursday at 6:00 p.m.
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join us!
We'd Love to See
You!
Happy Camp
is within a day's drive or less of many cities.
Cave
Junction, OR.....39
miles
Crescent City, CA.....85 miles
Eureka, CA.............155 miles
Grants Pass, OR........70 miles
Medford, OR...........106 miles
Page Mt Snow Park...23 miles
Redding, CA............164 miles
Sacramento, CA......350 miles
San Francisco, CA...386 miles
Yreka, CA................70 miles
Reno, NV...............328 miles
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Other
Communities
Along the Klamath River Corridor:
Orleans,
California
To
the Klamath River's Karuk tribe, Somes Bar is the center of the
universe. Powerful immortals by
cultural tradition have given the Katamin site, sugar loaf mountain,
Ishi Pishi Falls, and other local sites, strong medicines that anchor
this site permanently at the center of Karuk culture.
Like
much of the American West, the economic and cultural evolution of Somes
Bar began with gold mining and homestead ranching beginning in the
1850s. Soon
afterwards, logging and other
resource consumptive industry took prominence. While
these industries still exist here, most area businesses now are more
service based and emphasize recreation and tourism, resource
management or other lower impact cottage industries.
Somes
Bar is centered at the confluence of the Klamath and Salmon Rivers at
Latitude: 41.455226 Longitude: -123.476713 with an indeterminate
altitude in largely vertical terrain. This
is a strikingly beautiful, rugged and remote section of the middle
Klamath River with grid provided electrical power entirely unavailable
except at the Salmon River confluence. Private
land is limited to isolated parcels surrounded by larger tribal and
U.S. government land holdings.
The
Somes Bar population fluctuates around 200 permanent residents but this
small number seriously understates the importance of this area.
A reality check for the relevancy of Somes Bar
can be viewed by surveying the number of community
and governmental agencies that have an assigned oversight or otherwise
vested interest in monitoring and managing the area resourcesA partial list includes:
The Karuk Tribe, the U.S. Forest Service,
California Fish and Game, The California Department Of Forestry,
U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service, California State Water Resources Control
Board, NOAA Fisheries, The Klamath Forest Alliance, The Salmon River
Restoration Council, The Mid-Klamath Watershed Council, etc.
It would be an interesting calculation to
determine the ratio of persons employed to manage and watch the Somes
Bar Area resources to the number of persons actually living in the
area.
Somes
Bar remains an unincorporated community in Siskiyou County with the
historical cultural influences continuing on varying levels to this
date. This
mix of peoples and culture creates an amazingly divers community
composed of a small number of individuals. Some of the current cottage businesses include
local outfitter guides, organic famers, loggers, dude ranch resorts,
nurseries, resource managers and more.The
common bond shared by Somes Bar residents is an intense interest in a
preservation of the essential qualities and features of the area while
somehow finding an income sufficient to remain a local area resident.
People living here typically want to remain
here. Some strong community fabric
is manifest in the support for Junction School (two rooms for grades K
- 8), the community band, the Nena Creasy Christmas Bazaar, and in the
ongoing community dialogue on the Klamath River and forest managemen.t Opinions on how to manage and protect local
culture and natural resources both bond and divide the community and
are the heart of the debate for the Somes Bar future.
By Doug Cole
Thank you
for visiting the Happy Camp Chamber of Commerce website for Other
Communities Along the River Corridor: Orleans.
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