A historic deal was announced on Wednesday: the Washoe Tribe, pushed off land it members had lived on for thousands of years during the Gold Rush by settlers, miners and loggers in the 1850s, reclaimed some of their ancestral territory near Lake Tahoe.
The tribe spent $6 million to buy Loyalton Ranch, a scenic 10,274-acre property 35 miles north of Lake Tahoe in Sierra and Lassen counties, from the city of Santa Clara for $6 million. City leaders had purchased the property, which is home to herds of pronghorn antelope, mountain lions, wolves, mule deer and groves of aspen trees, in 1977 with plans for geothermal development for Santa Clara’s municipal utility. But that never panned out.
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