Adventure 003, Site 006-Hodgdon Homestead Cabin

Gary in front of the Hodgdon House

Capture California, the Game-2013

Adventure: 003, Site 006-Hodgdon Homestead Cabin

National Registry ID: 78000356

Team: YOLT

Date:  June 2, 2013

Location:

Coordinates: 37°32′20″N 119°39′19″W

Address: Wawona

Description:

Date Built: 1879

Architect: Jeremiah Hodgdon

The Hodgdon Homestead Cabin was built by Jeremiah Hodgdon in 1879 in the Aspen Valley area of what became Yosemite National Park. The two story log cabin, measuring 22 feet (6.7 m) by 30 feet (9.1 m), was located in an inholding in the park, owned by Hodgdon's descendants. In the 1950s the family proposed to demolish the structure. The National Park Service acquired it and moved it to its Pioneer Yosemite History Center at Wawona, where the restored cabin is part of an exhibit on early settlement and development of the Yosemite area. In addition to housing Hodgdon, the cabin housed workers on the Great Sierra Wagon Road in the 1880s, as a patrol cabin for U.S. Army troops who managed the new national park in the 1890s, and as a historic landmark at the old Aspen Valley Resort.[2]
The cabin is built of peeled logs, saddle-notched, with split log wedge chinking. A shed addition to the rear gives the structure the shape of a saltbox and is a frame structure covered with wood shingles. The cabin is fronted by a porch. (Wikipedia)

The Hodgdon cabin represents the role of the homesteaders, a controversial chapter of Yosemite’s history. Homesteaders claimed a portion of the Yosemite area under the stipulations of the Homesteading Act of 1864. The Hodgdons owned a ranch in the Sierra foothills and claimed a section of land near Yosemite as summer pasture. The Hodgdons, along with other pioneer families, opposed John Muir’s efforts to create Yosemite National Park, believing that it would erode their rights as property owners. After building the only two-story cabin in the region, and creating a summer home, the Hodgdons feared that the creation of Yosemite National Park would undermine their homesteading efforts. (PHCO)






References:

• Wikipedia
  
• Pioneer History Center Online (PHCO)
  
• NRHP-Text and Photos
  
• NoeHill
  

Overall Landmark References:

• National Registry of Historical Places (NRHP)