Whites Bridge or Whitesbridge is a former settlement on the

Fresno Slough Fresno Slough is a distributary of the Kings River that connects the North Fork Kings River to the San Joaquin River in San Joaquin Valley, Kings County, California. Until 1879 when irrigation diversions prevented it, Fresno Slough was also an ou ...

near

Tranquillity Tranquillity (also spelled tranquility) is the quality or state of being tranquil; that is, calm, serene, and worry-free. The word tranquillity appears in numerous texts ranging from the religious writings of Buddhism, where the term ''passaddhi'' ...

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 Census, the population was 1,008,654. The county seat is Fresno, the fifth-most populous city in Cali ...

History

It grew around White's Bridge, a bridge built over the Fresno Slough ten miles above Firebaugh by Fresno County pioneer James R. White.Paul E. Vandor, History of Fresno County, California: With Biographical Sketches, Volume 1, Historic Record Company, Los Angeles, 1919 The settlement of Whites Bridge became the new head of

steamboat A steamboat is a boat that is marine propulsion, propelled primarily by marine steam engine, steam power, typically driving propellers or Paddle steamer, paddlewheels. Steamboats sometimes use the ship prefix, prefix designation SS, S.S. or S/S ...

navigation on the slough at high water.Wallace W. Elliot, History of Fresno County, California: With Illustrations from Original Drawings ... with Biographical Sketches, Wallace W. Elliot & Co., San Francisco, 1882; reprinted by Valley Publishers, Fresno, 1973. Whites Bridge post office opened January 9, 1879.Frickstad, Walter N., A Century of California Post Offices 1848-1954, Philatelic Research Society, Oakland, CA. 1955. Pages 30-39. By 1881, the settlement in addition to the post office had a store and hotel, and was the site of sheep shearing. The wool and produce of local farms was shipped down river to Stockton and San Francisco. Large ranch holdings belonging to

Miller & Lux Henry Miller (July 21, 1827 – October 14, 1916) was a German-American rancher known as the "Cattle King of California" who at one point in the late 19th century was one of the largest land-owners in the United States. Life and work Born in ...

lay nearby along the San Joaquin River. The Whites Bridge post office closed on November 15, 1893, and was moved to Mendota.

References

Former settlements in Fresno County, California Former populated places in California {{FresnoCountyCA-geo-stub