The bookmark appears homemade. The leather has been softened to a suede-like feel, the image has been cut from a linen postcard and glued on, and the words are written, not printed. When I first saw this on eBay, I knew I had to have it.

My mother first visited Lake Arrowhead while she was in the sixth grade. The family of her best friend, Pat Randolph,  owned a cabin across the small road from the lake, and the two girls spent their summers, all the way through high school, among the pines trees.

I too visited the lake as a girl, but not as frequently. My mother’s brother owned a cabin during my growing up years and our family occasionally used it. It was not a lakefront cabin so we had a short hike when we wanted to swim and fish. I have a few pictures from that time, but other than those I don’t remember much about those visits.

The lake is privately owned and reserved for homeowners (with lake access for those having docks or permits to put boats in the lake). It consists of 784 acres with fourteen miles of shoreline and an average depth in non-drought years of 100 feet, going to 185 feet at its deepest. 

In 1976, my parents bought their own cabin there. It was on North John Muir Road and faced Emerald Bay. The two-story cabin sat just barely up from the bay and had its own dock. Despite the three-hour drive from Santa Barbara it was a favorite, and I often took friends up there for as long as ten days at a time. At 5,106 feet you can feel the effects of its altitude for the first day or two. But it is a quick adjustment, and I always enjoyed my first jog on the quiet roads the day after I arrived, breathing deeply of the pine-scented air and easy solitude (the population is only about 13,000). The cabin had been built in the 1950s and was just down the road from where my mother and Pat had spent their childhood and teen summers. We barbecued, swam, took the heavy canoe out, admired the pine trees and had a lot of fun.

About three years ago my parents, who no longer drove long distances, sold the cabin. I was sorry to see it go, but Lake Arrowhead had changed immensely. Watching it change had been painful. The atmosphere was no longer local with a welcoming feel. It had become a hardcore Tourist Central loaded with “designer outlet” stores specifically chosen to soak visitors’ wallets. Instead of lake spray—the smallish but pretty public beach had been eliminated—day visitors, unless they sneak onto one of the few private sandy areas or stay at the expensive Lake Arrowhead Resort hotel with its private shoreline, never touch lake water unless they hire the approved waterskiing outfit or take the official tour boat.

I miss the original feel of the lake, and when I came across this soft suede bookmark for sale on eBay a few years ago it struck such a note of nostalgia in me that I fought off, with considerable ferociousness, another bidder equally determined to get it. Having it and using it on occasion reminds me that what Lake Arrowhead has become isn’t what it always was . . .

The San Bernardino National Forest houses the San Bernardino mountains, which are a short mountain range at the eastern end of the Sierra Madre chain. The mountains lie ninety miles northeast of downtown Los Angeles, running approximately 60 miles east-west on the southern edge of the Mojave Desert. The highest peak is the San Gorgonio Mountain at 11,499 feet. The range is home to four recreational destinations (Crestline, Lake Arrowhead, Running Springs, and Big Bear Lake) and six lakes (Lake Gregory, Big Bear Lake, Lake Silverwood, Lake Arrowhead, Jenks Lake, and Green Valley Lake).

In June of 1851, a group of 500 Mormons traveled from Salt Lake City and set up a small settlement at the base of the mountains called San Bernardino. Needing lumber for the town they turned to the mountains but found no economical way to get it down until they built a road. Despite the road being both steep and dangerous, serious logging began in July, 1852. Most of the logging took place in the area from what is Crestline to Little Bear Valley, site of today’s Lake Arrowhead.

The recreational part began in a roundabout way in 1891 when the Arrowhead Reservoir and Power Company was formed in order to create a mammoth irrigation project on the western part of the mountains to supply water for the growing city of San Bernardino. After purchasing 4,000 acres of land in and around the area known as Little Bear Valley, obtaining water rights, and finishing a new toll road that would enable them to haul heavy equipment and supplies, they proceeded to build a dam that would be 200 feet high, 720 feet long and 1,100 feet thick at its base. Sixty miles of tunnels would move the water down the mountainside. 

Trees and bushes were cleared from what would become the bottom of the new lake to prevent future decay problems, and by 1912 the dam was 80 percent complete at a height of 160 feet. But it all came to a grinding halt in the next year when the Superior Court in San Bernardino, ruling on a 1911 suite from landowners from the desert or eastern side of the mountains to stop the company from diverting the natural flow of water, issued an injunction. Twenty-two years and almost three million dollars later, the Arrowhead Reservoir Company came to an end.

In 1921, a Los Angeles syndicate by the name of Arrowhead Lake Company purchased Little Bear Lake and all its properties. But they had no interest in selling the water. Rather they planned to build the finest mountain lake resort in southern California. So they finished the dam, raising it to a final height of 184 feet and renaming the water, Lake Arrowhead. (The name, incidentally, comes from the natural rock formation of an arrowhead on the face of the San Bernardino mountains near Arrowhead Hot Springs at the bottom of Highway 18, the road that leads up from the western side of the valley floor.)

Three luxury hotels (the Arlington Lodge, Village Inn and North Shore Tavern), a nine-hole  golf course, and exclusive tracts were put in as was a unique Norman English-style village. The new resort officially opened on June 24, 1922. The village included a dance pavilion, an outdoor movie theater, restaurant, beach and bath houses. It cost more than eight million dollars to develop, and promotion began at once. Postcards (including the one on this bookmark), newspaper and magazine advertising, art and more immediately turned Lake Arrowhead into a popular tourist destination. Some of the lakeside land was subdivided and homes were built. Hollywood used the area for making movies, and as a result a number of actors in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s stayed here and bought homes which continued to be developed as the water sources were.

It also became a well-liked rest and recuperation area for servicemen during World War II, important because the gas rationing of the time took its toll on tourists. Lot sales dwindled and eventually the Arrowhead Lake Company went bankrupt.

In 1946, the owners of the Santa Anita Racetrack and the Los Angeles Turf Club bought the lake and the surrounding properties. Although considerable amounts of money were spent in improving the lake and surrounding Arrowhead Woods, no lots were sold though donations of land were made to various organizations such as the Scouts.

In 1960, the Lake Arrowhead Development Company was formed by three developers from Los Angeles. They built the current 18-hole golf course and club house over the old 9-hole course and subdivided 18 residential tracts. In 1967 the Lake Arrowhead Development Company merged with Boise Cascade Corporation and additional subdivision of properties were created.

After the major Sylmar earthquake of 1971 (when another dam came close to breaking), a study was made of the Lake Arrowhead dam. It was determined that it would not withstand an earthquake of 6.5 or higher so a bond issue was passed and an earth-fill one constructed. A tiny lake was formed between the two dams that is known as Papoose Lake.

In 1979, a few years after my parents bought their cabin, the original village (with the sole exception of the pavilion) was destroyed. In its place, a new village was built. It is of the same architectural style, but its determined shininess makes it, at least to me, a bit tacky. The original feel is gone regardless of how it is dressed. What was so special about the village and the lake has been lost. I miss it very much. And I grieve for what it no longer is. What my mom had and what I enjoyed is in the past. Other things are now and in the future. But I am grateful for the bookmark that allows me to share my mom’s growing-up memories of a time and a place that made our childhoods special.  

From the website, Lake Arrowhead History, come these links to wonderful historical photos, maps, and advertisements.

Bookmark specifications: Lake Arrowhead
Dimensions: 7” x 1”
Material: Suede
Manufacturer: Homemade
Date: 1940s?
Acquired: eBay

Almost since her childhood days of Mother Goose, Lauren has been giving her opinion on books to anyone who will listen. That “talent” eventually took her out of magazine writing and into book reviewing in 2000 for an online review site where she cut her teeth (as well as a few authors). Stints as book editor for her local newspaper and contributing editor to Booklist and Bookmarks magazines has reinforced her belief that she has interesting things to say about books. Lauren shares her home with several significant others including three cats, nearly 1,300 bookmarks and approximately 1,200 books that, whether previously read or not, constitute her to-be-read stack. She is a member of the National Books Critics Circle (NBCC) as well as a longtime book design judge for Publishers Marketing Association’s Benjamin Franklin Awards. Contact Lauren.