LASSEN COLLEGE

Lassen Collège was established in 1925, in Susanville, California.     The main campus was next to the high school with a permanent building consisting of the administrative office, cafeteria and classrooms for general education classes.   Here I took English and Social Science my first year as part of the two year technical forestry curriculum from 1968 to 1970 under the GI Bill, which provided me with $130/month.  The forestry program was established in 1935, one of the oldest two year programs in the country.  On the southside of the high school were six temporary buildings for science classes, the gunsmithing and range management programs.   In two of these buildings I took botany and a mathematic class my first year.   

All the forestry classes and the log scaling program were located in an old grade school building on the south end of town.   Later I learned this was a condemned building.   Classes requiring field work, including forest mapping, timber cruising, photogrammetry and surveying were conducted in the woods of the Lassen National Forest.   A school bus was used to transport us twice a week no matter what the weather was.   In the winter snow shoes were required to get around on 3 to 6 feet of snow.  

There was no dormitory for the college and students were at the mercy of finding cheap housing in the community.   My first year I lived in a one room shed behind a house with access to a bathroom through the back door of the main house for $50/month.   The landlord owned a book store and gave me a part-time job painting the interior, giving me a break on the rent for a couple of months.   Other students lived in motels for a discount rate for acting as managers at night.   One student was a volunteer fireman and was able to live in the city fire house for free.   The second year a friend and I shared an apartment for $150/month, if I remember correctly.   Most the students in the forestry program were military veterans in their twenties and some older men looking for a new career in forestry.   

Today Lassen Community College has a big campus with 39 buildings on 165 acres with a dormitory east of Susanville, with an enrollment of 2000 to 2500 students.  The forestry, log scaling and range management programs are no longer available.  The gunsmithing program is still there and is the oldest in the country, being established in 1945.