A breif Historty of nelsonville, california

Gold was discovered in Coloma in January 1848, and after that, prospecting and mining expanded rapidly and flourished along the American River, including in the area known at the time as Mosquito Canyon or Little Mosquito. By 1850 there were two settlements near the canyon. Big House, aka Lower Town, which was probably located along Mosquito Cut-off, was inhabited mostly by “Spaniards”, a gold rush term that covered about any Spanish-speaking ethnic group.

It is worth noting that people of many different ethnicities lived and worked in the gold fields together. White Europeans, Spaniards, Chinese, Kanakas (a term used at the time for Hawaiians), various Native Americans, and others panned and dug through the water and land searching for the gold.

Some information, however, has been unearthed about the other settlement, Nelsonville, which was established along Mosquito Road south of Buckboard Road.

Through intensive research, it was found that Nelsonville was a surprisingly busy mining town with a robust population of about 2500. It contained:

• 3 stores – Gillen & Bryan’s, Ashley & Bailey’s, and William Deakin’s
• 2 hotels – the Mosquito Hotel and Ranchera Boarding House
• 2 doctors – Dr Eckles and Dr John Hill
• A meat store – Still and Fetterplace
• A Quartz mill known as Robinson’s
• Still’s Blacksmith Shop
• A Dance hall
• A Stable
• A bakery
• At least one restaurant
• A bowling alley
• And multiple saloons.

Nelsonville burned in 1865 and was never rebuilt and the name was mostly forgotten over time.

The cemetery, also known as Mosquito #1 and Summerfield Cemetery, served the Nelsonville and Mosquito farming/ranching area beginning around 1850. By the early 2000’s, it was in bad shape, essentially abandoned and ignored, overgrown with dense brush, with many downed trees and seriously thick poison oak encroachment. It was completely unwalkable and had extensive damage. Piecemeal work by three volunteers was slowly conducted to clear the overgrowth and repair the damage, but was very arduous and little progress was made.

Permission from the then-owner was requested and granted around 2015 to conduct a larger-scale restoration. The easiest access into the cemetery crossed another undeveloped property so the remote owner was contacted and granted permission to clear the access trail. 

The community hosted several cemetery clean-up days and sometimes had almost 20 volunteers. Volunteers used loppers, axes, hand saws, chainsaws, string trimmers, and sometimes a tractor. They leveled tilted or sagging headstones. They searched for, found, cleaned, and uprighted buried headstones. They epoxied stones which had broken apart back together and reset them. And, they created this website: nelsonvillecemetery.com.

After 4 years of work the cemetery was finally in great condition. To celebrate the accomplishment, and the cemetery and it’s inhabitants, workers had a community celebration and tribute that was held on July 28, 2019. At the end of that, the approximately 60 attendees toasted the 5 dance hall girls reported to be buried there in unmarked graves, following a fire. Then, on August 12, 2019, an article covered the restoration and tribute on the front-page of the Mountain Democrat newspaper.

Today, ongoing maintenance and upkeep, headstone cleaning and repair, and vegetation abatement continue.

The last burial in the cemetery was in April of 2022. Volunteers were there to advise the burial crew, help provide set up, parking assistance, ushering, or to offer to serve as pall bearers if that was needed. 

Two permanent signs with plexiglass graffiti protection were installed in May and were fully covered by community donations. One sign explains the brief known history of Nelsonville and the other is a known burial map.