Shasta Springs: 1953

I was 5 years old then. We had moved from Seattle to San Diego the year before. My father said, "Freddie, do you want to go up to the mountains with me? You can have the whole forest to yourself and there will be mountain streams and boys likely your age to play with on about 1800 acres of more with streams and forests?" It sounded pretty good so Dad left our 1941 Century Buick that had belonged to his brother Tommy in 1942 at home and hitched a ride in a 1949 Dodge with a lady from our church in San Diego to the Church Camp in shasta Springs for 6 weeks that summer. Dad was in between Electrician's jobs and had decided to donate his time working for our church helping set up the amphitheater in Mt. Shasta for the pageant of the life of Christ.

Boys 5 years old then were thought to be "young men" at that time in the 1950s. So, I was supposed to be okay without adult supervision on 1800 acres of trees and streams and cabins that once had been a resort that President Teddy Roosevelt had visited by Train and Tram in the early 1900s there. When I was 5 the Tram down to the railroad tracks was still operating but closed down within a few years of then. I started meeting boys mostly older than I from ages about 6 to 13 or 14. We all sort of hung out on the 1800 acres or so while our parents did volunteer work for the church that summer. My mother and grandmother stayed in San Diego. I'm not sure what they did but they showed up for the last two weeks and my mother and Dad and I were all in the pageant of the life of Christ for the public one Sunday in august. I think my favorite time of year was when we began to go there for at least 2 weeks every summer. I met kids who became life long friends during those two weeks from around the U.S. and some even from other countries there. It was a little like an earlier version of "Stand By Me" because I wasn't 10 or 12 yet. So, my adventures were more in the discovery side and hadn't progressed to the more sophisticated stage of the movie "Stand By Me" yet. But, I was sort of left to my own devices for at least 8 hours a day wandering around the church's grounds with boys I met from all over. This was an amazing experience to be in such a beautiful place and be relatively safe and allowed to play on the swings, wander around and have adventures in such a beautiful idyllic place basically unsupervised for at least 8 hours a day. Amazing!

Historical photos of Shasta Springs:

From age 5 through 21 many of these scenes I saw except for the old trains. But when I was little some of these buildings and the tram up to the top of the resort which was now a religious camp during the summers. So, from 1953 until 1969 I stayed in the resort with my parents or in the boys dorm after I was about 16 or 17 while there on the two weeks away from my home in either the Los Angeles area or the San Deigo area when I was 4 and 5, What a beautiful area to "grow up in part of the year".

Also, still when I was little there was also mineral water and ozone water which "burnt your nose" sort of like carbonation can too both near the tracks and up at the top of the tram. But, the ozone water that burnt your nose was only near the tracks then. I don't think it is still there now though as all the buildings slowly decayed form disuse over the years as they had been built at the turn of the century around 1900 or before when the railroad was the only easy way to get there for the rich like President Teddy Roosevelt. The tracks go all the way from Seattle to San Diego past Shasta Springs.