North Star Mine and North Star House: California Gold Mining History Preserved
The story of North Star House in Grass Valley, California begins with the North Star Mine, one of the most sig…
Hague House
Hague House
Built for the man who owned the North Star Mine — James Hague never got to call it home.
James Duncan Hague purchased the North Star Mine in 1887 and spent the following years consolidating claims and modernizing operations across the district. By the early 1900s, the mine was thriving, and Hague wanted a home on the property to match — one that would rival the Bourn family's estate at the nearby Empire Mine and impress investors and local leaders alike.
In 1904, he commissioned Julia Morgan, then a newly licensed architect, to design North Star House. Construction finished in 1905. But Hague, who had spent most of his life on the East Coast, died in 1908 without ever settling into the house he'd built. Instead, it became home to the Foote family — his brother-in-law Arthur De Wint Foote, superintendent of the mine, and Foote's wife, the author Mary Hallock Foote.
The house still carries Hague's name in spirit, even though it was the Footes who filled it with life.
From the Journal