Rocklin in Placer County, California — The American West (Pacific Coastal)
Rocklin's Front Street Business District
Photographed by Kevin W., January 29, 2025
1. Rocklin's Front Street Business District Marker
Inscription.
Rocklin's Front Street Business District. . The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were good economic times for Rocklin. The Central Pacific roundhouse opened in 1867 and employed 300 people. In most years, Rocklin's granite quarries were busy mining stone for many of California's monumental structures, including several bank buildings and county court houses. The steps and most of the exterior walls of the state capital building in Sacramento consist of granite blocks from Rocklin's quarries. Business was good in most years along Front Street, but activity slowed in 1908 as the Southern Pacific Railroad moved roundhouse operations to Roseville and the quarries faced labor strife and competition from cement-based concrete. By 1914 Front Street was mainly markets and hospitality businesses. There was a rooming house, a hotel and six saloons, including Porter's Saloon, Front Street's most famous turn-of-the-century watering hole. In May that year two young boys played with matches near the hay bales in Porter's livery stable and set Porter's building afire. Flames spread north and south and flattened every building north of the Barudoni Building and south of the post office at Rocklin Road. Rocklin's deteriorating early twentieth-century economy prevented the Front Street Business District from being rebuilt.
The late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were good economic times for Rocklin. The Central Pacific roundhouse opened in 1867 and employed 300 people. In most years, Rocklin's granite quarries were busy mining stone for many of California's monumental structures, including several bank buildings and county court houses. The steps and most of the exterior walls of the state capital building in Sacramento consist of granite blocks from Rocklin's quarries. Business was good in most years along Front Street, but activity slowed in 1908 as the Southern Pacific Railroad moved roundhouse operations to Roseville and the quarries faced labor strife and competition from cement-based concrete. By 1914 Front Street was mainly markets and hospitality businesses. There was a rooming house, a hotel and six saloons, including Porter's Saloon, Front Street's most famous turn-of-the-century watering hole. In May that year two young boys played with matches near the hay bales in Porter's livery stable and set Porter's building afire. Flames spread north and south and flattened every building north of the Barudoni Building and south of the post office at Rocklin Road. Rocklin's deteriorating early twentieth-century economy prevented the Front Street Business District from being rebuilt.
Erected 2014 by
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the Chapman family, the City of Rocklin and the Rocklin Historical Society.
Location. 38° 47.463′ N, 121° 14.299′ W. Marker is in Rocklin, California, in Placer County. It is on Front Street just south of Rocklin Road. Touch for map. Marker is at or near this postal address: 5251 Front Street, Rocklin CA 95677, United States of America. Touch for directions.
Regionally, this marker is in California’s Sacramento Metro, in the Sierra Nevada, and in the Lake Tahoe Basin. It is also in the American Mountain West. Globally, it is in North America, on the Ring of Fire, in the Pacific Rim, in the Western Hemisphere, in the Western World, and in the Anglosphere. Historically, it finds itself in what was once New Spain and also Mexicos Alta California.
2. Rocklin's Front Street Business District and Barudoni Building Markers
Front Street is in the background.
Credits. This page was last revised on January 2, 2026. It was originally submitted on January 2, 2026, by Kevin W. of Stafford, Virginia. This page has been viewed 77 times since then. Photos:1, 2. submitted on January 2, 2026, by Kevin W. of Stafford, Virginia.
