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Elks Lodge

    The grand white house at the tope of the hill on Main Street holds many wonderful memories for the city of Susanville from the first days of the pioneers to the present warm fellowship within the Elks Lodge.

   The Elks home is a beautiful landmark that has been overlooking the town of Susanville since 1884.  Plans for the unique home were first dreamed up by Dr. Frank Leonard, who had been an architect before taking up dentistry.  Drawing up the unusual star shaped plans he and Charles Odette Sr., a saw mill operator and builder, began construction of much of the house with lumber from Odette's sawmill.

   The Leonard family moved into the unfinished house in 1884 though it was not completed until 1887 due to the depression of the time.  Leonard move to Reno in 1890 after he tired of exchanging dentistry for everything except money.

   William Green then purchased the house but gave it to his two daughters, Fannie Asher and Hattie Grunauer, in 1896.  The William Goodwin family rented the house until 1901.  Goodwin was a young law graduate from Yale who practiced with his father in Susanville.

   Professor William O. Pierce and his wife, Grace, along with their two children Lucille and Harry, rented the house in 1902 for just $12.00 a month.  Professor Pierce traveled by horse and buggy around the valley and surrounding area giving music lessons, sometimes staying overnight in Standish as it was too far for a one-day buggy ride.

   Diamond Palmer came from Indian Valley to live with the Pierces while attending school.  She later married Frank Leonard in 1905 after meeting him at the house he had spent some of his childhood in.

   The house was bought in 1908 by Henry Swain who was friendly and very likable.  The upstairs bedrooms and the exterior of the house were finished for his family, a wife and four children.  She remained living in the house after her husband's death in 1917 and in 1918 Mrs. Swain rented the top floor to the officials of the Lassen Lumber & Box Company while construction was being completed on the mill.  Then, in 1923, Mrs. Swain sold the house to the Antlers Investment Corporation a group of 81 men who were interested in forming an Elks Lodge and needed a suitable place to meet.  BPOE 1487 has held the deed to the property since 1931.

   In 1947 the hall was added to the back of the house where the old barn used to be.  The Boy Scouts of America, graduation parties and many other activities the Elks sponsor add up to many happy memories for this old house that still stands on the land once owned by Isaac Roop.

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