Loomis, California
California
One man here was the entire town: saloon keeper, railroad agent, express agent, and postmaster all at once.
James Loomis ran the saloon. He also ran the railroad depot. And the express office. And the post office. For a stretch, he was the whole town by himself, and eventually the town took his name. It took a while to get there. The post office opened in 1861 as Placer. A year later it became Smithville, after a prominent local man named L.G. Smith. In 1869 it changed again, to Pino. That one caused trouble. The railroad and the post office kept finding Pino confused with Reno. So in 1890 the Southern Pacific settled the matter and called it Loomis. By the early nineteen hundreds the place was shipping fruit hard. Second busiest fruit-shipping station in Placer County. The winner was Newcastle, about six miles east.
This is the first of 2 parts. The rest runs about 2 minutes and is read to you as you drive past. Hear the whole piece.
At one time, James Loomis was the whole town—saloon keeper, railroad agent, express agent, and postmaster.
Written from Wikipedia, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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