Forest, California


Forest, also known as Forest City, is a small unincorporated community town site in Sierra County, California, United States, in the Sierra Nevada.
The town site of Forest is located at in elevation.

History

Gold was discovered here in 1852. The name of Brownsville was adopted as the name of the camp, after one of the sailors who had found the gold. By the next year, the population of Forest had swelled to over a thousand during the California Gold Rush. A vote was held in 1854 and the town's name was changed to "Forest City". The Bald Mountain drift mine was founded in August 1864, and was the largest of its kind in the state at the time. Large fires in 1865 and 1883 devastated the town, after which little was rebuilt.
Today, Forest is primarily a historic ghost town, though there are a few year-round residents. Old buildings still line its Main Street, including a former general store, saloon and dance hall. A one–room schoolhouse crowns the hill above town, along with a few scattered residences.
The National Socialist Kindred was originally located in Forest before it moved to a nearby property on Alleghany Ridge Road between Camptonville and North San Juan; afterwards, several associates of the National Alliance remained in Forest until the late 1990s.

Notable residents