Just a few miles away from the living ghost town of Truckee Nevada is the former settlement of Boca California which resides in the high sierras at an elevation of about 5,528'. The town itself remained active from about 1867 till about 1945 then it was completely eradicated off the map. However the cemetery, dam, reservoir, foundations and a few remnants of the past do remain if you are willing to explore the town site. The name Boca means "mouth" in Spanish and since the town resided at the mouth of the Little Truckee River where it empties in the main river this is how it had gotten its name.

At the time the settlement was erected it was just a construction camp #17 for the Central Pacific Railroad when a Judge Edwin Bryant Crocker named it. Judge Crocker was an older brother of Charles Crock whom was one of the Central Pacific's Big Four.  Other names you may recognize are Mark Hopkins, Collis Huntington and Leland Stanford. Hopkins is buried at the Sacramento Old City Cemetery which is another great location we have done some research at. During the construction of the Donner Summit Railroad Tunnels some of the foreman and laborers lived in Boca which is just a few miles away while lumberers came to the settlement to seek work at the mills surrounding the Stampede Reservoir and Hobart Mills. 

This led to the towns growth as once the railroad was complete the settlement would change its base of operations. Mills would be built in the area to lumber the mountains surrounding it. Such wood was necessary to supply the locomotives with fuel to traverse the mountains. It was also very cold in Boca some winters it had gotten down to -30 below zero therefore you needed the wood for the townsfolk's fireplaces and wood stoves. Timber would be also needed to build Boca's mills, snow sheds, telegraph poles, regional mines, businesses and homes. Since the town boasted very large sawmills and ice houses the timber was very necessary to be used for ties and trestles. 

I believe that the first Ice Company came to Boca in or around 1868 as a matter in fact besides lumber the ice industry here was booming. Back then you did not have refrigerators to keep things cool you had to get ice if you wanted a cold drink or to keep your meat from spoiling. The weather in Boca was very cool it was the perfect location to erect such ice houses. What started off as the Boca Mill and Ice Company grew into so much more. An Edward W. Hopkins the nephew of Mark Hopkins had purchased the Summit Ice Company at Prosser Creek just miles away then merged it was the one in Boca. It was named the Sierra Lakes Ice Company by 1878 and by 1881 many of the ice companies combined their operations to form the Union Ice Company. 

Lloyd Tevis from Wells Fargo Bank was the president as Edward W. Hopkins was the Vice President. By 1891 the company was incorporated named The Union Ice Company Inc. Believe it or not the ice industry was very important during the 1800's and it thrived in Boca. Ice could be shipped via box car on the railroad then exported across the country. This would allow fresh produce and meat to be shipped throughout the country. Allot of folks all the way up into Buffalo NY where I am originally from could enjoy a Californian orange fresh or grapes that were grown at a vineyard. Technically Boca was the ice capitol of the country and not allot of people are aware of this. If you mentioned Boca to just about anybody most people would be like "say what"! This is why I love Boca so much its a relevant all American historic site and although the town is long gone the history lives on here. 

This town had it all a general store, hotel, stagecoach station, telegraph office, saw mills, library, brewery, shingle house, school, saloons and even one of the most prominent breweries on the west coast for many years. It also boasted a post office which remained open till about 1945 once that closed you can bank on the fact the rest of the town had followed with it. In the 1800's a dam was created to build a mill pond harnessing the Little Truckee River. During the summer the millpond could be used to store logs as they would float while in the winter when the pond froze over it could be used as an ice harvesting field. As a matter in fact the six large ice houses in Boca stored thousands of tons of ice which was cut from the millpond then floated down a canal where it met a tram system which redirected it into the icehouse where it would be packed with sawdust. With it being so cool in the sierras year around the ice could be stored throughout summer however it would take thousands of tons to keep it from melting during the peak of summer. As a matter in fact some of the ice would be used in the mines of the Comstock Lode in Virginia City and Sierra City to keep the miners cool. 

I read an article that said that their was enough ice harvested during one single winter to supply all of California for over 12 years. In 1872 when there was numerous ice companies more wood, shingles and ice were being exported then just about anywhere in the country.  The town also had many cold natural springs so it was really ideal for having ice plants and even a major brewery site. I mean really what person does not like an ice cold beer on a hot summers day? Unlike most paranormal investigators I am not afraid to enjoy life a little I do not do what I do to get famous I can careless if our viewers know I love beer or herb. The brewery in its hey day produced over 30,000 barrels of ice cold beer each years and was located just across the river near the largest ice plant. If you sift through our photos below you can clearly see a series of multiple foundations from afar this was where the Boca Mill and Ice Company resided. 

A short line railroad led to a lumber mill up in Loyalton which is another town that today is still very much alive in California. Boca was said to have 200 residents in the 1880's but I have read other historical write ups that stated as many as 2,500 residents lived here. I do think that is quite possible considering that one of the ice plants had 300 employees then if each individual had a family such a wife and kids along with six very large ice plants and a brewery the number could have been much higher here! Besides the ice houses one of the greatest breweries of the 19th century produced the famous Boca Lager for many years. As a matter of fact it was one of the most popular beers in America and by 1883 it had won numerous awards at the World's Fair in Paris France. The lager was produced by mainly German laborers and being German I can tell you we know our beer lol! The ice nearby would be used in the fermentation of the lager without the ice or beer Boca would have never been put on the map!

You needed to have very cold temperatures to produce the lager and this area provided just that. You had cold fresh spring water, ice, freezing temperatures and allot of ice just across the road. You also had the railroad so that the lager could be shipped across the country. I been myself to various brewery sites in the wild west but most of them lacked refrigeration therefore they brewed ales and porters. Lager was a very rare commodity during this time period some may have considered it a very rare luxury! The brewery may have had as many as 80 men who worked tediously around the clock making sure that the lager was being produced to everyone's liking.  However sadly the brewery would not last very long it opened in the 1870's and by 1893 it burned down to the ground. It never was rebuilt this may have been because refrigeration had arrived in the 1880's therefore more Lager breweries were opening across the country. With ice being man made the natural ice harvesting business was becoming obsolete so again this may have also been the reason behind the breweries final demise not to rebuild.

I read that Anchor Brewing of San Francisco created a tribute lager called the Zymaster Series which was a limited addition during the cities beer week celebration. It was a tribute to Boca Beer and I am sad that I missed getting to gulp down a few lagers because I really have heard good things about this lager. When you do enough research like I do you learn to appreciate the history that no longer exist. It is folks like us still keeping it alive even if these locations no longer exist! I am truly amazed at how many folks do not even know this location exist despite how close it is to Truckee and the nearby highway. Lets face it there is not many ghost towns left in the Sierras especially with this rich of a history!!

Boca would begin to meet its decline after the Brewery burned down as with manmade ice many of the ice houses were being shut down. Although you had railroad workers living in Boca who cleared snow off the tracks eventually trains had built in plows therefore you did not need manual snow shovelers. All the trees surrounding Boca have been lumbered you can see that in the above panorama hence why I posted a photo of it for our viewers to see how bare the town site truly is. No trees meant that there no longer was a lumber business here therefore every avenue of industry was coming to a dead end here. Thus in 1908 the sawmill did close down and the trees really have not recovered due to all the years of lumbering. 

Boca's last major ice harvest took place in the 1920's around the same time that the Union Ice Company constructed a refrigeration plant in Reno and is currently home to the Glacier Ice Company. The ice plant was the last remaining one on the river and today you can clearly see its foundations scattered across a meadow near the train tracks. A fire had destroyed the Victorian hotel in 1904 which is the black & white photo of the structure with a flag on top of it. The Boca Dam was built in 1939 therefore the rest of the town was demolished. There were a few folks living here at the time but Boca was on its last leg and most of them had moved onto bigger towns such as nearby Truckee!

I do plan on doing a second part to this expedition there is much more to see in Boca believe me when I say that. Our first expedition covered a large area but we are unmasking some other hidden gems at the town site as well so stay tuned for that. Trains roll through the town regularly one could sit at the top of the hill where the old cemetery is located and enjoy them as the arms of the railroad cross come down roaring by. The cemetery contains many children most of the graves are not even marked or are missing while one of them is that of an adult. These children found here passed away from typhoid fever, pneumonia, intestinal problems and other diseases that back in the day we just did not have cures for. The cemetery is one of the last remaining remnants that really keeps Boca alive. These children lived here playing at the pond, climbing trees and watching the trains go by daily. Touring the cemetery kind of shows you what life was like living in Boca. It was very cold, secluded and life was harsh here because sickness often spread quickly taking any lives in its path.

For example the following is listed on a plaque near the cemetery so rather then you take the time to read it ill just post what it says here. First name listed is Little John Margaroli. His father was born in Italian and was a section Foreman for the railroad. His mother Edna Margaroli was born in Illinois. Then you have Patrick and Jeremiah O' Shea whose parents were Jerry and Margaret O'Shea who were natives of Ireland. Jerry was a section boss for the railroad. The final name listed on the plaque is that of Mynford Weeks whose father R.C. Weeks was born in Missouri and was a stenographer for the local ice company. Mynford's mother Scharlett Weeks was born in Nevada where we are currently based. 

There is over 70 years of history surrounding the town site of Boca its just to bad that its all really gone. Today campers can enjoy the reservoir and hiking in the area. If others feel inclined to do so the town site is bigger then it looks if you get out and explore it. During the Spring wild flowers here are in abundance so is a variety of bird life. If you walk around you will see old laundry pans, rusty buckets, twisted bean cans, broken glass, bricks, pieces of wood and many small remnants that were left behind during the towns heyday. Its sad to see it all gone but many of the foundations on the outskirts of town are massive giving away to Boca's early most successful industry's such as harvesting ice, railroading and the production of the countries best lager during the days when the west was wild!

Copyright By
Lord Rick
PGS Founder
Author, Talk Show Host, Producer and Paranormal Investigator

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