Unlike most of the other early Big Bear resorts that were being built in the 1920’s, the Pan Hot Springs Hotel and the Peter Pan Woodland Club were unique in that they were located at the east end of Bear Valley, away from the lake. The Pan Hot Springs Hotel main attraction was that it […]

In 1909, the Bear Valley Mutual Water Company accepted John Eastwood’s design for a new dam at Big Bear Lake to replace the original rock dam that had been built in 1885. Eastwood’s unique design called for an all concrete structure without any rock or dirt fill. Eleven concrete buttresses would be built across the […]

THE BEAR VALLEY HOTEL – 1888 In 1888, just four years after the rock dam was built that created Big Bear Lake, two local Big Bear ranchers, Gus Knight Jr. and John Metcalf built Big Bear’s first resort hotel. Big Bear village didn’t exist yet, and the only two roads into the valley should have […]