• excerpts from “The Placer County Courthouse” 
  complied by The committee for the Preservation of
  Auburn Regional History of the Placer County
  Historical Society
  
  “A Newsman Recalls the Courthouse” pages 13-14
  by Robert Elder
  “Among the many interesting occupants of the jail was a man who showed up in Auburn with a trunk full of human heads. He claimed to be a medical expert, lecturing on craniums; but his credentials weren’t too good, so they detained him until they could check him out. The newsmen labeled him the “head hunter” and developed all kinds of theories about the source of his heads. The news cameraman and I tried to persuade him to pose with a head propped on each knee. We thought it would make a great picture; but he was feeling sour over his incarceration and wouldn’t go for it. All our crime theories turned out blank, and the police finally released him. He apparently had gotten his heads from medical laboratories, or wherever they get such things.
  The superior court was also a good source of news stories with many interesting trials and inquests. I recall the coroner probing a curious case of a man who cut short his life by trying to lengthen it. The man had a theory that people died early because their spines got no exercise, and he set out to prove it. One day the coroner was called to investigate a hanging and found the man dangling by a rope from the limb of a tree. Beside him was a stool off which he apparently had stepped. The only strange thing was a small spring in the rope which hanged him. It made him bounce up and down. The coroner was inclined to call it suicide, but a lady neighbor protested. She claimed he used the rope and spring to exercise his spine. Every day, she testified, he would step off the stool and bounce up and down until his spine was well exercised. She said he expected to live to be 160, but for this slight slip up. “He even got me on the thing once”, the lady said, “but it jiggled me so bad I never tried it again. . .”

• Excerpts from: TO DONNER PASS FROM THE PACIFIC
  A map history covering 150 years of California’s
  Lincoln Hwy, U. S. 40, I-80, Henness Pass, Pacific Turnpike and Dutch Flat Donner Lake Toll roads from 1852 to 2002. 
  By Jack Duncan
  
  While the PG&E was increasing the height of Spaulding Dam in 1916 to its second of three heights, workmen accessed the project from the Lincoln Hwy at Emigrant Gap. They noticed that a view of exceeding beauty could be had of the dam project and Bear Valley from a nearby rock. The company built a public service lookout station at that site “where the traveler might rest from his journey and at the same time enjoy a magnificent panorama of the Sierra.” 
  
  A restaurant was added to the lookout. In 1930, US-40 was moved closer to the facility giving motorists easier access. The road move was necessary so it would better align with the new paved railroad underpass. (Charles Barieau, Auburn). 
  
  Nyack Lodge was built at the site of the PG&E lookout. This new lodge added rooms, a larger restaurant and ultimately a service station. The dirt road (shown in a picture in his book) labeled L. Hwy was the Dutch Flat Donner Lake Wagon Road, Lincoln Hwy, Victory Hwy. And early US-40. (Note: this is now an overlook area. No evidence of the Lincoln Hwy or Hwy-40 can be found– Jack Duncan). 

• Auburn's First Fire Trucks
  
  Lee Aplin is an avid historical researcher obtaining this information from many sources. These are available on request.
  
  The disastrous fire in Auburn in 1912 was the impetus for the volunteer firemen in Auburn to try to get motorized fire trucks. The hose wagons were difficult to handle on the steep streets and dangerous to man and horses. Automotive fire trucks were discussed whenever firemen met.
  
  On August 13, 1914 a newspaper article reported: The Auburn volunteer firemen will have auto fire trucks. That was practically decided upon at the mass meeting held at Recreation Park Thursday night...... Mr. Armstrong asked all who favored the purchase of the new apparatus to stand. Everybody stood up, but when subscriptions were called for, only a few subscribed.
  
  A week later only $50 in added subscriptions had been made. Then C. A. Taber (recorded in the minutes of the Board of Trustees as a consultant, in the newspaper as a salesman) chanced to come by  and recommended that the city should issue bonds to finance the purchase of trucks.  History doesn't seem to have recorded whether Mr. Tabor ever received any business as a result of his recommendations,, but the suggestion was acted upon by the Board of Trustees with the enthusiastic approval of the firemen.
  
  The financing consumed a bit more than eight months. In another month bid requests to supply the fire trucks were announced with a bid opening date of April 24, 1916. The bidders were Buick, Studebaker, Kissel and Garford.
  
  The bid request contained the following: Bidders must be prepared to demonstrate any of the equipment covered by bid.  The competition between the bidders to demonstrate their vehicle's ability to climb up Linden Street must have taken place between April 5th and April 24, 1916. Carroll Locher was the top performer in the Linden demonstration and was the lowest bidder (by $100) at $4,780. The firemen were understandably enthusiastic in their approval of the Trustees' purchase award to  C. D. Locher, the local Buick dealer.
  
  The trucks were delivered in a railroad boxcar from the distributor in San Francisco.
  The trucks were build as grocery delivery trucks and had to be converted for fire fighting use. The dismantling was done in Locher's garage, which was in the high street building opposite the clock tower. When that work was completed the chassis were towed to Haines Blacksmith Shop (Auburn Iron Works). Earl Eiche worked for Haines as a coach builder and built the bodies one at a time. As each was completed, it was taken to W. B. Hughes for painting before delivery to Locher. Until all three had been finished they were on display in the window of Locher's showroom.
  
  On the night the finished trucks were delivered the firemen paraded them through town before taking them to their stations. The driver of the truck to be delivered to Old Town reported a foul smell from his rig. Locker looked at the truck and told the driver, "You didn't release the emergency brake." The driver said, "I was so excited I didn't even notice it."
  
  Lee Aplin
  
  
  

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