Folsom Lake

The Folsom Lake State Recreation Area surrounds Folsom Lake in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The majority of it is owned by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation and is managed by the California Department of Parks and Recreation. It is located near the city of Folsom, California, about 25 miles (40 km) east of Sacramento.

The North Fork American River is the longest branch of the American River in Northern California. It is 88 miles (142 km) long from its source at the crest of the Sierra Nevada, near Lake Tahoe, to its mouth at Folsom Lake northeast of Sacramento. Prior to the construction of Folsom Dam the river was about 9 miles (14 km) longer making for a total length of 97 miles (156 km). It rises at Mountain Meadow Lake near the 9,008 ft (2,746 m) peak of Granite Chief in the Tahoe National Forest. Flowing initially northwest, the river soon swings west into a gorge, paralleling the Forest Hill Divide on the south. Big Granite Creek then joins the North Fork of the American River coming in from the right. The canyon shallows as the river turns southwest, carving through the Sierra foothills, then turning abruptly south near Colfax. About 4 miles (6.4 km) downstream, it receives Shirttail Creek from the left then is impounded in Lake Clementine (or North Fork Lake) which is formed by the North Fork Dam, built in 1939 to contain hydraulic mining debris.Below the dam, the river bends south, passing under the Foresthill Bridge, the highest bridge in California, then receives the Middle Fork American River, its largest tributary, from the left. The valley widens as the river flows south past Auburn, soon emptying into the north arm of Folsom Lake, a reservoir formed in 1955 by the Folsom Dam. Its waters merge in the lake with those of the South Fork American River and form the American River, a tributary of the Sacramento River.

Folsom Dam is a concrete gravity dam on the American River of Northern California in the United States, about 25 mi (40 km) northeast of Sacramento. The dam is 340 ft (100 m) high and 1,400 ft (430 m) long, flanked by earthen wing dams. It was completed in 1955, and officially opened the following year. Located at the junction of the north and south forks of the American River, the dam was built by the United States Army Corps of Engineers, and was transferred to the United States Bureau of Reclamation upon its completion. The dam and its reservoir, Folsom Lake, are part of the Central Valley Project, a multipurpose project that provides flood control, hydroelectricity, irrigation, and municipal water supply. To increase Sacramento's flood protection to 200-year flood protection (meaning that the area is protected from a flood that has a 0.5% chance of occurring in any given year), the Corps of Engineers recently constructed an auxiliary spillway, which was completed in October 2017; it enables Folsom Dam operators to increase outflows to prevent the lake level from reaching or exceeding the height of the main dam gates.Another Central Valley Project dam, Nimbus Dam, is located further down river.

Mormon Island was once a mining town, which had an abundance of Mormon immigrants seeking gold in the American River during the California Gold Rush. Its site is in present-day Sacramento County, California.

The South Fork American River is a major tributary of the American River in El Dorado County, California, draining a watershed on the western slope of the Sierra Nevada east of Sacramento. The river begins in pristine Desolation Wilderness and flows through the Sierra Nevada foothills. The river at Coloma was the site of James Marshall's discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill on January 24, 1848, which started the California Gold Rush. The South Fork of the American is "the most popular recreation stream in the West" for whitewater rafting in North America, e.g., 80,000 visitors in 2011. Professional whitewater rafting companies have been offering commercial rafting trips on the South Fork American River since 1978.

California State Prison, Sacramento (SAC) is a male-only state prison located in the city of Folsom, in Sacramento County, California. The facility is also referenced as Sacramento State Prison, CSP-Sacramento, CSP-SAC, and occasionally, New Folsom or New Folsom Prison which was its official name prior to October 1992.Because the facility is adjacent to Folsom State Prison (FSP), both SAC and FSP share the mailing address: Represa, CA 95671. Represa (translated as "dam" from the Spanish language) is the name given to the State Prison post office because its adjacency to Folsom Dam.The facility houses maximum security prisoners who were difficult to manage at other prisons and who have long sentences.

Hidden Valley (formerly, Union House) is a housing development in an unincorporated area of Placer County, California, adjacent to Granite Bay. Hidden Valley is located 4.25 miles (6.8 km) east-southeast of Rocklin. It lies at an elevation of 436 feet (133 m).Hidden Valley was established in 1950 and consists of semi-rural housing lots surrounding 180 acres of pasture and small lakes. It was originally planned as a retirement community, due to its rural setting, but it has since become a bedroom community for the Sacramento metropolitan area. It was once informally called the "Aerojet enclave" for the large number of executives of the aerospace company who resided in the area.

Folsom California State Prison is a California State Prison in Folsom, California, U.S., approximately 20 miles (32 km) northeast of the state capital of Sacramento. It is one of 34 adult institutions operated by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.Opened in 1880, Folsom is the state's second-oldest prison, after San Quentin, and the first in the United States to have electricity. Folsom was also one of the first maximum security prisons. It has been the execution site of 93 condemned prisoners.Musician Johnny Cash put on two live performances at the prison on January 13, 1968. These were recorded and released as a live album titled At Folsom Prison. He had written and recorded the song "Folsom Prison Blues" more than a decade earlier.

The September 1937 Folsom escape was an attempt by seven inmates to escape Folsom State Prison, a famous prison in the United States. During this attempt, Warden Clarence Larkin, Officer Harry Martin, and two of the escapees died. The remaining five were eventually executed.

Granite Bay is a census-designated place (CDP) in Placer County, California, United States. It is part of the Sacramento–Arden-Arcade–Roseville Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 21,247 at the 2020 census, up from 20,402 at the 2010 census. The ZIP codes are 95746 and 95661. Granite Bay is a primarily residential suburb of Sacramento and is located just east of Roseville and west of Folsom Lake.

The Folsom City Zoo Sanctuary (originally Folsom Zoo) is a zoo and animal sanctuary located in the city of Folsom, California, in the United States, which has been open since 1963. The facility differs from traditional zoos and is more like a sanctuary in the way the animals are acquired and the care they receive. Though the facility allows visitors like a traditional zoo, the animals are not bred, sold, or traded.The Folsom City Zoo Sanctuary is supported by Friends of the Folsom Zoo, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which helps by providing both funding and volunteers.

Folsom Powerhouse State Historic Park is a historical site preserving an 1895 alternating current (AC) hydroelectric power station—one of the first in the United States. Before the Folsom powerhouse was built nearly all electric power houses were using direct current (DC) generators powered by steam engines located within a very few miles of where the power was needed. The use of rushing water to generate hydroelectric power and then transmitting it long distances to where it could be used was not initially economically feasible as long as the electricity generated was low-voltage direct current. Once it was invented, AC power made it feasible to convert the electrical power to high voltage by using the newly invented transformers and to then economically transmit the power long distances to where it was needed. Lower voltage electrical power, which is much easier and safer to use, could be easily gotten by using transformers to convert the high voltage power to lower voltages near where it was being used. DC power cannot use a transformer to change its voltage. The Folsom Powerhouse, using part of the American River's rushing water to power its turbines connected to newly invented AC generators, generated three phase 60 cycle AC electricity (the same that's used today in the United States) that was boosted by newly invented transformers from 800 volts as generated to 11,000 volts and transmitted to Sacramento over a 22 mi (35 km)-long distribution line, one of the longest electrical distribution lines in the United States at the time.