Skip to main content

Maxon Road (Fresno County)

By

Maxon Road is an approximately five-mile rural highway located in the Sierra Nevada foothills of Fresno County.  The corridor begins at Watts Valley Road and extends eastward to Trimmer Springs Road at the Pine Flat Reservoir.  Maxon Road is named after the Maxon's Hotel which used be located on the Kings River near the Trimmer Springs Resort.  The highway corridor begins appearing on maps in the 1920s and was modernized during 1947-1954 amid construction of Pine Flat Dam.  




Part 1; the history of Maxon Road

The corridor of Maxon Road is named after Maxon's Hotel was located on Trimmer Springs Road next to the site of the Trimmer Springs Resort.  The history of Maxon's Hotel is not clearly documented compared to the Trimmer Springs Resort. 

In 1889 Morris Trimmer would develop a resort along the Sanger Log Flume Road (now Trimmer Springs Road).  The Trimmer Springs resort would obtain Post Office Service originally the same year it opened.  By 1890 the postal service shuttered but it would reopen for a second time in 1892 and not close again until 1919.  The Sanger Log Flume Road east of Centerville would eventually come to be known as "Trimmer Springs Road" whereas the segment west to Sanger became known as "Rainbow Avenue." 

Trimmer Springs Resort and Maxon's Hotel can both be seen along the Kings River on the 1914 Weber & Company map of Fresno County.  Maxon's Hotel is shown to be connected to nearby Watts Valley by way of Sycamore Creek.


What is now modern Maxon Road first appears on 1920s era United States Geological Survey maps connecting Watts Valley to the Trimmer Springs Resort.  The corridor can be seen on the 1924 Dinuba edition following mostly the course of Watts Creek eastward. 


The Maxon Road corridor was improved between 1947-1954 when Pine Flat Dam was being constructed.  The then upcoming reservoir required the relocation of much of Trimmer Springs Road which made Maxon Road ideal to facilitate movement to the area on an interim basis.  

Maxon Road can be seen as it is presently configured on the 1965 United States Geological Survey map.  The corridor is shown to cross a 1,655-foot elevation ridge near the Trimmer Ranger Station.  The site of Maxon's Hotel and the Trimmer Springs Resort now lie under the waters of the Pine Flat Reservoir.  




Part 2; a drive on Maxon Road

Eastbound Maxon Road begins at Watts Valley Road in the namesake valley.  


Maxon Road departs Watts Valley beings to pick up the course of Watts Creek.  









Maxon Road briefly follows Watts Creek and splits away towards an unnamed ridge.  






The corridor of Maxon Road continues east and crests the unnamed 1,655-foot-high ridge.  















Maxon Road continues east through a series of switchbacks and passes the Sierra National Forest Trimmer Work Center.  The corridor terminates at Trimmer Springs Road within sight of the Pine Flat Reservoir.  



















Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Did Caltrans just kill the G26 cutout US Route shields?

By
The US Route System was formally created by the American Association of State Highway Officials during November 1926.  Through the history of the system the only state to which has elected to maintain cutout US Route shields has been California.  The G26 series cutout US Route shields have become a favorite in the road enthusiast hobby and are generally considered to be much more visually pleasing than the standard Federal Highway Administration variant.  However, the G26 shield series appears to have been killed off on January 18, 2026, when Caltrans updated their Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices.  This blog will examine the history of the US Route shield specifications in California and what is happening with the 2026 changes.  The blog cover photo is facing towards the terminus of California State Route 136 and at a G26-2 specification US Route 395 shield.  In the background Mount Whitney can be seen in the Sierra Nevada range.   ...
2 comments
Read more

May 2023 Ontario Trip (Part 3 of 3)

By
  Over the years, I have made plenty of trips to Ontario, crisscrossing the southern, central and eastern parts of the province. Living in Upstate New York, it's pretty easy to visit our neighbor to the north, or is that our neighbor to the west? Ottawa is one of my favorite cities to visit anywhere in the world, plus I've discovered the charm of Kingston, the waterfalls of Hamilton (which is on the same Niagara Escarpment that brings us Niagara Falls), the sheer beauty of the Bruce Peninsula, and more. But I hadn't explored much of Cottage Country. So I decided to change that, and what better time to go than over Memorial Day weekend, when the daylight is long and I have an extra day to explore. On the third and final day of my trip, I started in Huntsville and made my way through Muskoka District and Haliburton County, passing by many lakes along the way. I stopped in towns such as Dorset, Haliburton and Bancroft before making a beeline down to Belleville and then over th...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ghost Town Tuesday; Nichols, FL

By
A couple years ago I spent a lot of spare time exploring phosphate mining ghost towns in the Bone Valley of Polk County, Florida.  One ghost town in particular called Nichols on Polk County Route 676 west of Mulberry caught my eye due to a relative lack of documentation on ghosttowns.com. Nichols was created in 1905 during the early phosphate mining boom in the Bone Valley region.  For the time Nichols was unusual since it had company housing in the Nichols Mine site and private residences outside the gate.  Nichols is only about two miles west of Mulberry which probably made it a somewhat reasonable commute even by the wonky standards of the early 20th Century.  Most of the Bone Valley region was relatively remote which made commuting or homesteading impractical which is why there are so many ghost towns in the area.  The company housing section of Nichols was phased out and abandoned by 1950. The Nichols town site is largely abandoned and could "possibl...
4 comments
Read more