The original Tule River Indian Reservation in Tulare County was established in 1856 on prime farmland in what is now east Porterville. After California’s Gold Rush began in 1848, thousands of discouraged prospectors began settling instead in the Central Valley to farm its rich soil. Their rapidly increasing population and conversion of the natural landscape caused increasing conflict with the Yokuts-speaking people who had thrived here for thousands of years and were being rapidly dispossessed of their land and livelihood. In 1856, hundreds of the Yokuts were forced onto this “permanent homeland” reservation.

     By 1857, Thomas Madden and two other local Indian agents illegally acquired state patents and title to most of the 2,240-acre original reservation, which came to be called the Madden Farm. The reservation Indians peaceably cultivated the farm’s fertile land and an additional 800 acres of adjacent federal land, producing abundant fruits, vegetables, wheat, and barley.

     But by 1863, white settlers were agitating ever more insistently to push the Indians off their “permanent homeland” so that it could be opened to the whites. Consequently, in 1873, a new reservation was established about 15 miles to the east in foothill and mountain land. While the new reservation was much larger, 48,000 acres, only about 250 of its acres were farmable, so it could not begin to support the Indians. They refused to abandon their crops on the original reservation until, in 1876, they were violently relocated to the new one, where their enduring descendants continue to strive for self-government and self-sufficiency on that land today.

     In 2025, the Tule River Indian Tribe regained 17,000 acres of its ancestral land, which it plans to restore to reconnect landscapes between the Giant Sequoia National Monument, the Tule River Indian Reservation, and San Joaquin Valley wetlands. Partnering with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the tribe has reintroduced beavers and tule elk to the land and is protecting the California condor’s historic range. The tribe’s management of the land is expected to improve groundwater recharge, reduce flood risks, and secure water supplies for disadvantaged communities downstream. So importantly, it is also a place for the tribe “to gather, heal, and simply be.”

March 2026

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     The Tulare Assembly Center at the Tulare County Fairgrounds (one of 16 Temporary Detention Camps for Japanese Americans) incarcerated almost 5,000 people in April-September, 1942. Most were then transferred to the hastily built Gila River concentration camp in Arizona and imprisoned there until autumn, 1945. (It was Executive Order 9066, issued in February, 1942, after Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, that a month later stripped of their rights about 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry — 2/3 of whom were U.S. citizens — on the U. S. West Coast, followed by their forced imprisonment beginning in April.)

     The military relocation order was finally rescinded in December, 1944, after the Supreme Court ruled that continued detention without cause was unconstitutional. The Gila River internees were released in phases, with the majority of the camp shut down in the fall of 1945.

     While the Tulare Assembly Center (along with all the other temporary detention camps in California) was registered as a California Historical Landmark in 1980, the Tulare Center has never had a historical marker or any memorial erected at its site to commemorate and explain the unconstitutional continued detention without cause of the Japanese American internees in 1942.

     Fortunately, that will change, as a group of history students at Tulare’s Mission Oak High School have been working for a number of years now to remedy this omission, with the Tulare County Fair Board’s approval and support.

     The students’ ongoing efforts have already resulted in the creation of a 5’x8′ bronze bas relief sculpture by noted artist Sam Pena depicting internees arriving at the Center. It will be a major feature in the historical monument these scholars are planning to create and install prominently inside the fairgrounds’ main entrance. Amid Japanese garden-inspired landscaping, the memorial will include informational panels and bronze plates naming all those who were incarcerated in the Tulare Assembly Center.

     The hundreds of thousands of diverse visitors to the fairgrounds’ events annually will be met and enlightened by this arresting display. And the monument will also focus a long-range educational program with local schools and the Tulare Historical Museum to continue the students’ mission to increase awareness and understanding of what happened here in 1942 — so that we will Never Forget that something like this must never happen again in our nation.

January 2026

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     St. John’s River Trail is a scenic City of Visalia Treasure, inviting you to travel up to 4.4 level miles along its namesake river on a paved path suitable for people of all ages and abilities (and dogs, allowed on leash) to walk, hike, run, or wheel along while enjoying the views, reading the interpretive signs, admiring the areas where native trees and smaller plants have been restored, birdwatching, taking a break on a trailside bench, or visiting some of the adjacent parks via their short connecting trails. Early morning and sunset hours are most photogenic.

January, 2026

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     The Tule River Stage Station serving the Butterfield Overland Mail stage route through Tulare County in 1858-1861 was housed on this site (which had been a riverside stopover on the old emigrant trail since 1854). In 1860, Royal Porter Putnam was the station’s keeper. In 1862, a huge flood moved the Tule River’s course south a mile. Convinced that the river would stay in its new course, Putnam bought 40 acres of land around the station’s site, got the parcel surveyed, and laid out the plat of a new town, still called Porterville today.

January 2026

     Woodville Park provides the small town of Woodville with a free, fenced, 10-acre gathering space for residents and visitors of all ages and abilities, offering shaded playground equipment, an arbor, 5 picnic tables with BBQ grills, a soccer field, a 9-hole disc golf course, a baseball diamond with backstop, a basketball court, horseshoe pits, paved pathways, open green spaces, and a restroom. Volunteers tend and add to the grounds (new plants, flagpole, baseball field), and put on events (movie nights, resource fairs, holiday celebrations) keeping the park alive and lively. Vive el parque!

January, 2026

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     Success Lake, in the scenic Sierra Nevada foothills just 8 miles east of Porterville, formed in 1961 after its huge earth-filled dam was completed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to provide flood risk and water supply management, wildlife habitat, and extensive recreation opportunities including biking, birdwatching, boating, camping, learning at campfire programs and Ranger talks, fishing, hiking, hunting, photography, picnicking, stargazing, swimming, and wildflower and wildlife viewing.  Open year-round, the 2,450-acre reservoir and its neighboring 1500-acre wildlife refuge promise visitors of all ages and abilities a great day out in nature.

January, 2026

The Project Team will be conducting research for a full article page as volunteer time allows.  Contact Us if you’d like to help research, write about, and/or illustrate this Treasure!