Poole's Ferry

<br> <i>Side A - North</i><br> <b><center>Poole's Ferry</b></center> Most important of Kings River's earliest crossings, it was operated from 1851 - 1857 by William Campbell and John Poole 3 miles above this point. The ferry and its trading post served travelers and miners. In July, 1852, it became the focus of violence when an armed party led by Walter Harvey, Tulare County's first judge, raided a Choinumni Yocuts Indian Village. Yosemite discoverer Major James D. Savage, famed Indian trader and peacemaker, tried to ease tensions but was shot and killed by Harvey in an argument at the trading post on August 16, 1852.<br><br> <i>Side B - South</i><br> <b><center>Smith's Ferry</b></center> Operated here from 1855 - 1874 by Mr. & Mrs. James Smith, the precursor of Reedley's settlement in 1888. It outlasted other Kings River ferries since Smith's was the only boat that could be approached at high water. His family kept a two story, 11 room hotel on what is now the cemetery's north end where Smith, who died in 1862, rests in the oldest grave. His widow sold the businesses in February 1874. Within months, they closed, victims of the Central Pacific Railroad's construction west of here in 1872. Smith, an early-day assemblyman, is memorialized in the name of a mountain east of here.