An Interesting Old Home in Auburn

Friday, June 2, 2017

We began the day with the proverbial visit to the local Visitors Center located in an old fire station

and in the old town area where we collected information about local sites to see and ran into Ron’s friend Larry and wife who had just finished lunch at a local restaurant.  I guess it’s a small town when you run into the only person you know in town.  

Auburn was never a prime gold field, but rather survived by becoming a supply and trading center.  It was also devastated by a series of major fires in the 1850's due to its wooden building.  Subsequent buildings were built of brick.  Claude Chana, a Frenchman, was the first to discover gold in this area in 1848 and is depicted in this statue in Old Town depicting him panning for gold.

After reviewing all the information, we left to go to the Bernhard Museum located in the old Bernhard home which we found just over the hill from our camp site.  The house was orginally constructed as the Traveler's Rest Hotel in 1851 and today is one of the oldest frame houses in the Sierra Foothills.   In 1858 it became a home and in 1868 it was bought by German immigrant Bernhard Bernhard.  A winery was added in 1874 and began processing in 1881.  This was the Bernhard family home until 1957.

What a find this place was.  We were given a personal tour by a docent who shared information about the family who had lived in the house and how the house had been restored after falling into a terrible state of disrepair.  It was purchased by the Auburn Historical Society and all monies for the restoration were raised locally.  No state or federal funds.

This museum also offers a Living History Day to third and fourth graders from the local schools.  Students and parents and teachers spend the day at the house learning hands on how things were done in the 1800’s from washing and ironing clothes, to cooking food (biscuits and butter), to making fruit boxes and containers for carrying their marbles.  What a great way to teach children history and learn about local people and events.

Inside the home we found a number of interesting and unique (to us anyway) items which I am sharing with you.

The first items are framed pictures in what I thought were leather frames.  It turns out these are hand carved frames.  Beautifully done and very unique.

Also on the walls were the following:

A wreath made of feathers

A picture and frame made from sand and shells

On the dining room table we found among other things bone dishes (I have a hand painted one done by my great, great aunt) but we had pointed out to us this unique covered silver sugar bowl with each family member having their own special spoon and place to put it on the side of the bowl.  

Also on the table was a special silver utensil for helping a young child to learn to pick up food on a spoon while learning to eat.  Had never heard of this before.

The house was nicely furnished and the stories about the family interesting.

Kitchen

Dining Room

Bedroom

The candle below was used when a young man came to court the daughter of the home.  The higher the candle above the black wrought iron around the candle showed how well the parents liked the young man.  The taller the candle the longer the candle would burn and the young man could stay.   

Another thing I learned was that corn starch was used for starching clothes.  And I only thought you used it to thicken gravies.

The family here had a vineyard and fruit trees and was into making their own wine which they sold.  Behind the house is the building where the grapes were brought in from the fields and processed before being bottled.  A door high in the back allowed the carts to be backed up to the building and the grapes dumped into a bin that was sitting lower in the building. 

The building below is the winery where wine was processed.

Auburn is quite a warm area in the summer so Mr. Bernhard used stone to build the building and lined the floor of the first floor (ground level) with wood, then a layer of sand and another layer of wood in order to insulate the room below and keep it cool for storing the wine.  On the ground level floor of the building he put in four chimneys to allow hot air to escape out of the building and cool air to come in.  Interesting concept.  Today, the street level (bottom level of the building) is a winery.  You can see here the stones used to make the walls.

The wine merchant told us that fine sand still filters into the this level when people walk around on the floor above.

After leaving the Museum we wandered into the Old Town area where we walked around the streets taking pictures and poking into the many shops.  Below is an old 1852 fire station including a 1914 hook and ladder truck

1914 Hook and Ladder Truck

and other stores in the area.

Down another street we found this statue of a Chinese laborer.

The Chinese helped to build the railroads here as in many other parts of the country.   A beautiful old Courthouse sits high above the area

and is still used for court with a museum in the bottom level.  We will take in this museum another day. 

The remainder of the day we spent getting acquainted with the area and driving up and down the tree lined hills.  This large old house (we could only see part of it as the rest is surrounded by new buildings which do not allow access to the front) is now an Inn.

We also found a few other interesting buildings and this old bank.

Tomorrow we will go with Ron’s friend and wife to see some of the other areas nearby.