Wyntoon

Wyntoon is a private estate in rural Siskiyou County, California, owned by the Hearst Corporation. Architects Willis Polk, Bernard Maybeck and Julia Morgan all designed structures for Wyntoon, beginning in 1899.

The land, sited at two sharp bends in the McCloud River, was named by financial adviser Edward Clark for the local Native American tribe of the Wintun people. Beginning as a humble fishing resort, the land was improved by a series of people, notably San Francisco attorney Charles Stetson Wheeler, his client Phoebe Apperson Hearst, and her son William Randolph Hearst who disputed with his cousin over ownership. Prominent structures, noted for their architecture, have been built on the land, some lost to fire, while other multimillion-dollar buildings were planned, but not built. Famous visitors to Wyntoon include Clark Gable, Charles Lindbergh, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. and his son John F. Kennedy.

The earliest known inhabitants of the area of Wyntoon were the Winnemem Wintu tribe of Native Americans, a subgroup of the Wintun people.

In the 1880s, outdoorsman, guide, hunter and trapper Justin Hinckley Sisson came to the area and established a hotel, restaurant and tavern at the foot of Mount Shasta. He advocated for a railroad line to be extended northward from Redding to his location, and was successful. Construction of the Central Pacific Railroad through the Siskiyou Trail began in the mid-1880s, and Sisson bought 120 acres (49 ha) in its path. The railroad was completed in 1887 and brought miners, hunters, fishermen, loggers, naturalists and tourists. With his wife, the former Miss Lydia Field, Sisson operated the inn, and he led various groups of hunters, geologists and mountain climbers. With profits from his successful business, Sisson acquired large parcels of land including the tract which would become Wyntoon. He established the town of Sisson surrounding his inn, and he built a fishing resort a half-day's ride away on the McCloud River, at an elevation between 2,700 and 3,000 feet (820 and 910 m), some 16 miles (26 km) distant. Popular with hunters and fishermen, it became known as "Sisson's-on-the-McCloud".

Justin Sisson died in 1893. In 1924, the town of Sisson was renamed Mount Shasta, California.

In 1899, Sisson's widow sold the McCloud River fishing resort site to Charles Stetson Wheeler, a wealthy attorney from San Francisco. This parcel lay in the Cascade Range of mountains, south by southeast of Mount Shasta. Wheeler called this holding the Wheeler Ranch, and he built a hunting lodge on the river at Horseshoe Bend—its cornerstone was laid in 1899. The multi-wing lodge, dramatic with its stone walls and slate roof, was designed by San Francisco architect Willis Polk, and included an 800-book library with room for hundreds of Native American baskets. Wheeler directed Polk to give the lodge a "fish tower"—a high study with a view, and two windows which were aquariums containing local trout. A Latin inscription over the entrance indicated this room was a temple to fishing: piscatoribus sacrum. Polk's design was pictured in July 1899 in The American Architect and Building News which described it as a "California Mountain Home". Sir Banister Fletcher included the building in a list of Shingle Style architecture. The layout of the structure, a "rambling group of masses", snaked through the trees, curving to follow the bend in the river, the curve creating a courtyard with a circular drive and a central fountain. The dining room enjoyed a three-sided view of the river, and diners could take the air on a wraparound porch. The porch opened to the river in a flight of wooden steps leading down to an octagonal gazebo pierced and supported by a large tree, overhanging the tumbling waters. Massive fireplaces and heavy timbers gave the impression of a medieval estate interior. Polk's use of stone and wood on the exterior achieved a sense of compatibility with the land, celebrating the setting's primal beauty.

The Wheeler family stayed at the ranch many a summer. In 1900, Wheeler invited his client Phoebe Hearst to visit Wheeler Ranch with his family for the summer. Hearst asked if she could purchase the land, but Wheeler declined. Insistent, Hearst came to an arrangement whereby she would purchase a 99-year lease on part of the land, and she also purchased adjoining land held by Edward Clark, her financial adviser, who called it Wyntoon for the local Wintu tribe. Hearst applied the name Wyntoon to the combination of Clark's former holdings and her new lease, and in 1901 contracted for a magnificent seven-story house to be built. Wheeler was displeased with the extravagant plans, as he and Hearst had previously agreed her building would be modest. However, he did not stop her.

Wheeler retained the part of Wheeler Ranch that was not leased to Hearst, including The Bend. In 1911, Wheeler invited Austro-Hungarian artist and naturalist Edward Stuhl and his wife Rosie to live on the property; they made extensive studies of plant and animal life in the area, and collected many hundreds of specimens. Stuhl, an avid mountain climber, published Wildflowers of Mount Shasta from his base at Wheeler Ranch. After Wheeler's death in 1923, Stuhl served as custodian of the ranch. William Randolph Hearst bought Wyntoon outright from its 99-year lease in 1929, and in 1934 bought all of Wheeler Ranch and The Bend, a combined total of 50,000 acres (20,000 ha).