Recreation
While the working life of McCloud River Lumber and Railroad Company employees involved long hours and was often grueling and hazardous, the workers and their families found, or were provided, numerous ways to enjoy time off from the myriad jobs that the companies required to run their operations smoothly.
To gain the best sense of what it was like to live in McCloud as a company town, one need only listen to the voices of those who experienced it. Following are a few snippets published in the McCloud issue of The Siskiyou Pioneer in Folklore, Fact and Fiction (Vol. 6, No. 10. The Siskiyou County Historical Society. 1997. Available for sale at the Museum):
"South of Highway 89 to the right of Old Mill and Cadorna, a ski jump and bobsled slide were provided. It was lit at night, and there was plenty of wood for a bonfire for the sports fans. In some years it was cold enough for ice skating, and the tennis court in front of the McCloud Hotel on Main Streeet would be used until 10 a.m. when it would warm up and mush the ice"
(The Town and its Services, by Ray Ebbe)
"I remember the Saturday Night Dances with music by the Hottentots. I remember nights watching the bears come in to feed at the City Dump".
(I Remember Grandma, by Edena Duncan)
