Remember When: April 15, 2009

Mr. Roycroft came to Shasta County and ran a ferryboat at Cow Creek before moving to Anderson. Once in town, he established a brickyard on the corner of East and North streets.

Gen. Bidwell asked him to make the bricks for Chico State Normal School, now Chico State University.

He sent along strict orders that Roycroft was to use only white labor in making his bricks.

Roycroft built "The Marshall House," a large hotel in Anderson, in 1885. Baseball players were his big customers as baseball was the favorite sport of the times.

Fierce competition existed among the various communities. Teams would sometimes travel by train to the gold mining communities of Kennett and Corum in the Sacramento River canyon north of Redding. At other times, they would go to Cottonwood and Red Bluff.

When the teams traveled, the players would stay in hotels at various locations.

In those days, money was measured in terms of gold slugs. One time, when Roycroft was leaving, he wrapped his gold in red underwear and buried it. Upon his return, his underwear was torn into shreds and spread all over his yard. Local pigs, which were once quite prolific in Anderson, had dug the bundle up. However, Roycroft did retrieve his gold.

Eventually, Roycroft laid out the town of Red Bluff and also collaborated with Ed Frisbie in laying out the town of Anderson.

The Roycroft home was located on the corner of Howard and Freeman streets, where he and his wife raised seven children. A portion of the street was set aside for Indian dances. The Indian chief was named Towendolly and the Indian campgrounds were near West Anderson Drive.

One of Roycroft's sons was a bookkeeper for Terry Mills. "Little Stevie" was frail and needed a great deal of attention. However, he eventually outlived them all.

The name of the hotel in Anderson changed many times from its original name of Marshall House. Finally, it became known simply as the Anderson Hotel. It was located where the Allan and Dahl Funeral Chapel now sits. Young Steve eventually became a bartender at the hotel, which caused great worry for his mother.

Young Steve was a very successful businessman and purchased much property in the area. On a parcel of property where the Anderson Post Office now stands, he erected the first Catholic church. He moved an existing church building, built prior to the 1900s in Keswick, to Anderson. He had it dismantled and loaded on a flat car to bring it down the valley. Steve then used the windows, communion rail and altar and some of the useable lumber to reconstruct the church.

Later, he purchased the property where the present Catholic church and school are located on Stingy Lane. He donated that property to the church as well as donating some of the money needed to construct the church facilities that now exist. The present Knights of Columbus building is the original rectory brought from the old location at Ferry and East streets.