Woodleaf is an unincorporated community in Yuba County, California. It is located northeast of Challenge, at an elevation of 3133 feet. A post office operated at Woodleaf from 1898 to 1971, with a closure from 1945 to 1947. Originally named after Charles Barker who settled here in 1850, the name now honors James Wood who bought the property in 1858. Excerpts from: Woodleaf Legacy by Rosemarie Mossinger Chapter Six The Grand Hotel The Barker House was found to be on the property originally claimed by John M. Abbott in the fall of 1853. Abbott had built a house and barns nearby. Joseph Wood had returned to California with his second wife Susan and her daughter Alice. This was Joseph's third cross-country trip. On a previous trip in 1845 he had lost his entire family on the overland journey. On November 4, 1853 in Marysville courthouse, a deed was granted to Joseph Wood for the "Abbott House, all out houses, stables, corrals, household and kitchen furnishings including bar fixrutes, blanktes, cots" for $3,500. The deed also described an enormous 60 ft x 18 ft woodshed. The proceeds from selling his Lafayettte House, sometimes called the La FayetteMountaineer Hotel, in Forbsetown paid for Abbott House. By this time Forbestown was the largest town in the area, with hotels, saloons, doctors, a Justice of the Peace, shoe shops, a water company, general merchandise stores and even a brass band. Nearby Brownsville was growing too, with a lumber mill, cemetery, hotel and shops. It wasn't long before Abbott House had a new name - Woodville. Joseph constructed a barn made of hand-hewn beams measuring sixteen to twenty inches thick and fitted with mortise and tenon joints fastened by hand-carved wooden pegs. The barn measured fifty by eighty feet and handled up to sixty thousand pounds of freight daily. The trails connecting California to the rest of the states, ran right through Woodville. In 1855 rumors spread of a National Wagon Road system, so Joseph had drawn up plans for a grand hotel. Joseph P. Wood had learned brickmaking, masonry and carpentry from his father, who had built a large mansion in Ohio, that the family had run as a hotel, coach station and tavern. This home is on the National Registry. In 1856, Wood petitioned the U.S. Post Office Department to make a post office at Woodville, with Joseph being its Postmaster. Stagecoaches arrived carrying weary travelers and, as improvements to the hotel were made, business flourished. copyright Carl Mautz Publishing 1995 Young Life operates a camp in Woodleaf.
