“Together the Flournoys look to the future. They’re relentless in their well-organized, and hard-working farming and the cattle business, but they predict that some of the ranch’s future may be in its water. The Lazy F has springs and wells scattered across the property, and the corporation owns substantial water rights to the South Fork of the Pit River. At 4,000 feet in elevation, the growing season is only 100 days long, while down in Yolo County and Read More …
“It was a good life that John D. Flournoy was searching for when he first rode into this high country in 1871. One of the thousands of young Missouri men drawn west on the Oregon Trail, Flournoy wandered into California and worked as a cowhand in Yolo County in 1865. When feed provisions fell drastically low in Yolo County as the winter of ’71 approached, John saw an opportunity. He and a partner offered to winter ranchers’ cattle Read More …
“Likely, California, population 200. The town may be small, but it’s even smaller from my airplane window, where miniature buildings and ant-sized vehicles continue to shrink with each dizzying foot we climb. I try to relax a white-knuckled grip on the arm of the passenger seat of John Flournoy’s vintage 1952 light plane. I laughed earlier when John asked if I was sure I wanted to go up to take aerial photographs of the ranch. “The last plane Read More …