Big Creek (Big Creek Flats in the 1870s; Manzanita Park in 1902; until 1926, Cascada) is a small

census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

Fresno County, California Fresno County (), officially the County of Fresno, is a county located in the central portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 1,008,654. The county seat is Fresno, the fifth-most popu ...

, located in the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada ( ) is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primari ...

on the north bank of Big Creek. It lies at an elevation of above sea level. Its last population count was 175. The ZIP code is 93605, and the community is inside

area code 559 Area codes 559 and 357 are telephone area codes in the North American Numbering Plan for the central San Joaquin Valley in central California. The numbering plan area includes the counties of Fresno, Madera, Kings, and Tulare, an area largely c ...

History

Big Creek was built at the site of the first

dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, aqua ...

and

power plant A power station, also referred to as a power plant and sometimes generating station or generating plant, is an industrial facility for the electricity generation, generation of electric power. Power stations are generally connected to an electr ...

of Southern California Edison's Big Creek Hydroelectric Project, one of the most extensive in the world. Other than the private

helipad A helipad is the landing area of a heliport, in use by helicopters, powered lift, and vertical lift aircraft to land on surface. While helicopters and powered lift aircraft are able to operate on a variety of relatively flat surfaces, a fa ...

owned by Southern California Edison, the only way in or out of the town is Big Creek Road, off of State Route 168. The dam has a walkway across it to the south bank, but access is limited to employees of SCE and those residents who have been given a key. Its major industries are

electric power generation Electricity generation is the process of generating electric power from sources of primary energy. For utilities in the electric power industry, it is the stage prior to its delivery ( transmission, distribution, etc.) to end users or its stor ...

and

tourism Tourism is travel for pleasure, and the Commerce, commercial activity of providing and supporting such travel. World Tourism Organization, UN Tourism defines tourism more generally, in terms which go "beyond the common perception of tourism as ...

. There is

camping Camping is a form of outdoor recreation or outdoor education involving overnight stays with a basic temporary shelter such as a tent. Camping can also include a recreational vehicle, sheltered cabins, a permanent tent, a shelter such as a Bivy bag ...

and water recreation in the summer and snow skiing in the winter. Huntington Lake is to the northeast and Shaver Lake is to the south. China Peak is only about away. Though Big Creek's only school is an elementary, it teaches kindergarten through 8th grade. The penstock pipes for the original two units at Big Creek Power Houses One and Two, built 1912–13, were purchased from the

Krupp Friedrich Krupp AG Hoesch-Krupp (formerly Fried. Krupp AG and Friedrich Krupp GmbH), trade name, trading as Krupp, was the largest company in Europe at the beginning of the 20th century as well as Germany's premier weapons manufacturer dur ...

Works in Germany because at that time that manufacturer produced steel pipes of the tensile strength needed to contain the very high water pressures in the pipes in the drop down to Power House One. All post-World War One penstock pipes were manufactured in the United States. The first post office opened at Big Creek in 1912. Half the town's homes were destroyed by the 2020 Creek Fire.

Demographics

Big Creek first appeared as a

census designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

in the 2010 U.S. Census. The 2020 United States census reported that Big Creek had a population of 151. The population density was . The racial makeup of Big Creek was 117 (77.5%)

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0 (0.0%)

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 5 (3.3%) Native American, 3 (2.0%) Asian, 0 (0.0%)

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...

, 7 (4.6%) from other races, and 19 (12.6%) from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 12 persons (7.9%). The whole population lived in households. There were 58 households, out of which 32.8% had children under the age of 18 living in them, 28 (48.3%) were married-couple households, 2 (3.4%) were

cohabiting Cohabitation is an arrangement where people who are not legally married live together as a couple. They are often involved in a romantic or sexually intimate relationship on a long-term or permanent basis. Such arrangements have become incr ...

couple households, 11 (19.0%) had a female householder with no partner present, and 17 (29.3%) had a male householder with no partner present. 24 households (41.4%) were one person, and 12 (20.7%) were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.60. There were 34

families Family (from ) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictability, structure, and safety as ...

(58.6% of all households). The age distribution was as follows: 46 people (30.5%) under the age of 18, 11 people (7.3%) aged 18 to 24, 34 people (22.5%) aged 25 to 44, 33 people (21.9%) aged 45 to 64, and 27 people (17.9%) who were 65years of age or older. The median age was 39.5years. There were 73 males and 78 females. There were 123 housing units at an average density of , of which 58 (47.2%) were occupied. Of these, 26 (44.8%) were owner-occupied, and 32 (55.2%) were occupied by renters.

References

External links

Big Creek Demographics

The Big Creek Project

History

Demographics

References

External links

See also