Another of the historic California Gold Rush towns is Weaverville California. It is located at the foot of the Trinity Alps Wilderness and was once home to 2,000 Chinese gold miners. Weaverville continued to stay active in the timber and logging industry after the gold rush, but due to environmental concerns the industry has declined recently.
Weaverville is among the many towns with legends and stories of famous gunfights and gold finds of the old west. Black Bart even robbed a bank in Weaverville, California. Today, it is forest fires which most threaten the area and as recently as 2006, the town was evacuated due to threats of a nearby fire.
The Chinese miners were most prevalent in the gold rush and is responsible for the Joss House, which is called the “Temple of the Forest Beneath the Clouds” It is a Taoist temple built in 1874. Currently, Weaverville is not big in terms of population with only about 3,500 people residing there. It had the population density of 100 people per square mile. The ethnicity of the area, where once was primarily Chinese, now is white, with only fractions of African American, Native American, Asian, and Pacific Islanders scattered among the population.
Like much of California now, Weaverville is primarily an area that is considered “Republican” and has been for quite some time. The demographics of the Weaverville of today and that of the old west are very different indeed. Time, progress and the darker side of history all played a part in that coming to pass. Weaverville, none-the-less, is seeped in History as part of the California Gold rush of 1849.