*** Source: Thompson, Robert A., Historical and descriptive sketch of Sonoma County, California. Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & Co., 1877, 122 pgs. Notice: This data is donated to the Public Domain by TAG, 2004, and may be copied freely by anyone to anywhere. *** ---page 99--- OCCIDENTAL POST-OFFICE. This place is on the narrow-gauge road where it crosses the divide, between the waters flowing into O'Farrell valley on the south side, and through Howard caņon into Russian river on the north side. The station is called Howard's station, after William Howard, who settled there in 1849, and is still a resident of the place. The town-site belongs partly to Mr. Howard and partly to the Meeker Bros. It is a place of recent growth, but already boasts of a post, express, and telegraph office, a good hotel, general store, blacksmith shop, church &c. Unlike most towns in Sonoma, it is surrounded by forests, and the stump of a tree stands in the main street, out of which one hundred and twenty thousand shingles were made. The Rev. M. George has charge of the church. The first store was started by McCaughey & Co., on the 4th of April, 1877. J.W. Noble opened a hotel in January, 1877, which is called the Summit House. The population of the place is about fifty souls. DUNCAN'S MILL. This village is situated on the south bank of Russian river, one and one-half miles from the sea. The mill was built in 1860 by S. M. & A. Duncan; it has been in successful operation for the past sixteen years; during that time a thriving village has grown up around it. In the town there is a hotel, a post and express office, store, and telegraph office, and a population of about one hundred. S. M. Duncan and his former partner, Hendy, were members of the first company organized to cut timber in Sonoma county. The company was formed of mechanics at work on the Benicia barracks, in 1849. Charles McDermott was president, and John Bailiff, secretary. The price of timber was then three hundred dollars a thousand. The company organized under the name of the Blumedale Lumber Company, in honor of F. G. Blume, on whose land, near the present town of Freestone, they built a mill. The price of lum- ber tumbled by the time the company got at work, and it soon after went into liquidation. Its effects were purchased, and it was revised under the firm name of Hendy & Duncan. General George Stoneman was a partner in the firm. They did not make it go, and the machinery was taken to the mines, where it was run awhile, and was brought back to the county in 1852 by Hendy & Dun- can, who built at Salt Point the first steam saw-mill on the coast. From Salt Point the mill was removed to Russian river by S. M. & A. Duncan, and took the name of Duncan's mill. The boiler purchased by the Blumedale Company in 1849 is still used by A. Duncan, the successor of Hendy & Duncan, and S. M. & A. Duncan. At this time, 1877, a joint stock company, known as the Duncan's Mill Land and Lumber Company, has been inaugurated, and the mill was moved to its present location, on the north side of Russian river, at a point where the North Pacific Railroad crosses the river, the present terminus of the road. It will retain its original name of Duncan's mill. FORT ROSS. We have elsewhere given a sketch of the early history of this place, the first settled by Europeans north of San Francisco. Bodega bay was occupied by the *** end ***