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SITE NAVIGATION

Sacramento Valley Station History Overview

1840s: European Settlers Come to the Nisenan Land

Sacramento Valley Station History Overview

1840s: European Settlers Come to the Nisenan Land

The site of the Sacramento Valley Station and the Southern Pacific Railyards originally was a large low-lying area at the confluence of the American and the Sacramento Rivers. Prior to the mid-nineteenth century, the area was inhabited by the Nisenan people, whose culture was connected to the river to which they adapted their settlements to the seasonal flooding of the great river in the valley lowlands. One village center was located in the current Railyards area along the historic confluence of the American and Sacramento rivers.

Once European settlers came into the area, increasing dramatically with the founding of gold in the foothills in 1848, the decline of the Nisenan accelerated through epidemics and hostile actions spurred by the new inhabitants to the area.

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Map of 1854 shows the initial low-lying area and confluence of the rivers that was altered in the 1862 flood.

Following devasting floods in 1862 the American River was straightened and diverted north and two lakes were formed, Willow Lake and Sutter’s Lake. The marshland at Sutter’s Lake was also known as China Lake or China Slough in reference to the Chinese railroad workers that lived and operated businesses at the southern edge.

In 1862 the Central Pacific Railroad constructed a passenger station named the “Arcade Station” next to the slough and wanted to expand their operations. Through the 19th and early 20th century, the Central Pacific Railroad gradually completed and effort to reclaim the land, fill the polluted marshland, and displace the Chinese population.

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Map of 1867 shows the newly formed Sutter's Lake after the devastating floods in 1862.

The filled land became the site of the expansive Sacramento Railyards complex and the Sacramento Valley Station, with masonry and wood buildings largely supported by deep wooden piles driven through filled soils.to the gravel bed some 60 feet below.

The original Central Pacific station was located along Front Street, where a replica stands today, but in the 1870's the railroad built the "Arcade Station" near the shops complex with a new wooden bridge across the Sacramento River, known as the "H Street Bridge."

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Map of 1882 shows the "Arcade Station" that was constructed after the Central Pacific Railroad consolidated at the shops

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