Carlotta is an
unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
in
Humboldt County,
California
California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...
.
It is located southeast of
Fortuna
Fortuna (, equivalent to the Greek mythology, Greek goddess Tyche) is the goddess of fortune and the personification of luck in Religion in ancient Rome, Roman religion who, largely thanks to the Late Antique author Boethius, remained popular thr ...
,
at an elevation of ,
about east of
US Route 101 on
California State Route 36
State Route 36 (SR 36) is an east–west state highway in the U.S. state of California that is routed from U.S. Route 101 in California, U.S. Route 101 in Humboldt County, California, Humboldt County to U.S. Route 395 in California, U.S. Rou ...
.
History
Carlotta is named after Carlotta Vance, daughter of
John M. Vance, who laid out the town
as a summer resort.
The first post office at Carlotta opened in 1903.
At that time, it had several cottages, a hotel, store, blacksmith and saloon.
Around 1915, a large farm at Carlotta was converted into a branch of Cottage Garden Nurseries, a company headquartered in New York; an orchard and thousands of ornamental plants were installed.
Prohibition did in the saloon for a decade, and the depression of the 1930s reduced resort business, but the logging boom following
World War II
World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
resulted in the construction of two large mills and housing for workers surrounding the town.
The hotel was essentially unchanged in 1975 which the National Register application form was filed.
It was with a kitchen annex which burned down in 1974.
The hotel was three stories high with dormers on a hip roof, wood shingle on the upper two stories but board and batten below.
A veranda with gingerbread features ran the full length of the face and around the south side.
Both ends had brick chimneys on the outside.
The building was one of several resorts on the Overland Stage Route, today's Route 36.
The hotel was known for popular Sunday dinners, Fourth of July celebrations, races and games; the clientele arrived and departed by train from Eureka.
The Vance family sold the town of Carlotta to local investors, including two of the local shopkeepers, in December 1921.
The hotel remained under the same ownership from 1921 to 1977 when the heirs sold it, although it was also closed for several years in the 1920s to 1930s until being run by Joe Matteucci starting around 1936.
The Matteucci family operated the hotel and restaurant for about 30 years.
The Carlotta Hotel was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places for significant architecture, little change since construction and a representative of roadside hotels.
The town and hotel were sold to Angelo Batini in 1977 who reopened the Carlotta Hotel in 1984. The hotel and restaurant operated until an electrical fire in the mid-1990s destroyed the building.
In 2006, the two abandoned mills were still standing, but most of Carlotta's residents commute to Fortuna or Eureka for work.
Geography
The town is adjacent to
Yager Creek which joins the Van Duzen slightly downstream from Carlotta. The
ZIP Code is 95528. The community is inside
area code 707
Area codes 707 and 369 are telephone area codes in the North American Numbering Plan (NANP) for the northwestern part of the U.S. state of California. The area codes serve part of the northern San Francisco Bay Area, as well as the North Coast. ...
. The nearest airport is the
Rohnerville Airport in Fortuna.
Education
Carlotta is the seat of the
Cuddeback Union School District,
[Humboldt County Office of Education]
/ref> and home of the Cuddeback School, a public K-8 school located just off Route 36.[Cuddeback Union School District]
/ref>
Government
In the state legislature
A state legislature is a Legislature, legislative branch or body of a State (country subdivision), political subdivision in a Federalism, federal system.
Two federations literally use the term "state legislature":
* The legislative branches of ...
, Carlotta is in , and .
Federally, Carlotta is in .
Notable residents
Robert F. Fisher lived in Carlotta from 1912 until his death in 1969.[California Assembly Concurrent Resolution 151, Chapter 282, 1969] He served as California State Assemblyman for Humboldt County from 1926 to 1932 and was the last surviving serviceman of the Spanish–American War
The Spanish–American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898) was fought between Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States in 1898. It began with the sinking of the USS Maine (1889), USS ''Maine'' in Havana Harbor in Cuba, and resulted in the ...
in Humboldt County.["Golden Wedding To Be Celebrated By Fisher's," ''Eureka Humboldt Standard'', 10 August 1962, Page 8]
Resident and convicted sex offender Melvin Just was the subject of a 2000 documentary film, Just, Melvin: Just Evil by James Ronald Whitney, his step grandson. Whitney's sisters, cousins, aunts, extended step family and ambiguously complicit grandmother detail decades of Just's sexual abuse. The film also references Just's long suspected murder of a county social worker sent to check on the family.
References
{{authority control
Populated places established in 1903
Unincorporated communities in Humboldt County, California
1903 establishments in California
Unincorporated communities in California