Gasquet, CA

Gasquet sits in Del Norte County along US 199, about 22 miles south of Oregon and 18 miles northeast of Crescent City. The community occupies a mountain-and-river setting inside the Smith River National Recreation Area, where the highway follows the Smith River country toward the coast. Its name honors Horace Gasquet, a nineteenth-century entrepreneur who owned local gold mines, a hotel, railway, bank, and post office and is also remembered as a founder of Crescent City and Happy Camp. The post office opened in 1879, closed in 1902, and returned in 1949; it still serves the community today.

ATTRAcroterion / CC BY-SA 3.0

Gasquet's strongest historic landmark is the Gasquet Ranger Station Historic District, a Forest Service compound on a terrace between US 199 and the Middle Fork of the Smith River. Most of its historic buildings were built by Civilian Conservation Corps crews between 1933 and 1939, including the district office, ranger residence, garages, warehouse, and fuel house. That work gives the place an unusually tangible link to the public-land history around it. In daily life, Gasquet is a small gateway community: a place for river country, forest roads, and the long drive between Crescent City and the Oregon border.