Historic store, in continuous operation since 1852.
Knights Ferry is located at a point where the Stanislaus River leaves its narrow canyon and approaches the Great Central Valley of California. This natural river crossing site provided an ideal location for William Knight's trading post. The traffic generated by the Gold Rush enabled to develop into a major river crossing and trading center, at the main road from the Central Valley to the Southern Mines.
It developed into a town, and
as placer deposits in the immediate vicinity proved to be gold-bearing
the town became a center of mining activity in the 1850's. The townsite
was laid out on the north bank of the river; Main Street, the commercial
and political axis of the town, was laid out parallel to the river.
Residences were built on the hillside behind, only buildings on the lower side of Main Street were subject to the rise and fall of floodwaters of the Stanislaus River.
Knights Ferry is the most picturesque of the old Stanislaus River towns with many buildings remaining from its period of primary historical significance as an early mining and trading center and seat of county government. A number of buildings still show Classical and Gothic Revival preferences. Along Main Street remain the old Knights Ferry Hotel; the General Store, in operation since 1852; and the old Odd Fellows Lodge Hall. At the edge of the "plaza" (the site of the courthouse when Knights Ferry served as the county seat from 1862 to 1872) stand the Masonic Hall and the Abraham Schell House; these two Classical Revival buildings were constructed by Schell, who arrived in Knights Ferry in 1856 from New York. They appear in a photo dated 1860, hence their date of construction falls within the 1856-60 period.
Many of the side streets on the hillside above Main Street are terraced with walls of locally quarried sandstone. Some of these houses from the early town's history retain the basic Gothic Revival lines, although alterations have taken place. The small shingled Methodist Episcopal Church, from the early 1900's, occupies the site of the earlier 1860 church. The Dent House, also "Long House", from the early 1850s, still retains the integrity of its original design.
In the 1860's the top of the hill overlooking the town became the site of Knights Ferry's schoolhouse, replaced in 1899 by another schoolhouse that survived until the 60s when a new, modern school replaced it.
Source: 1975 entry to historic places register