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Cora Nettie Hight Yarbrough
1868-1956
Block 15, Lot A3b
Historian Ardis Manly Walker recalls in his The Rough and The Righteous of the Kern River Diggins that Nettie lived a pattern of pioneer times. On October 3, 1868, during a storm in the Greenhorn Mountains, Nettie was born to Charles & Sarah Hight in the hurried shelter of a deserted cabin with the help of Glennville midwife Grandma Allen. Nettie spent her childhood in the log home on the family's mountain homestead, watching her father make furniture and her mother make soap and candles using lye made from oak ashes in an ash hopper. In 1879 (about the time this photo was taken), the family moved down the mountain to Kernville where all 6 Hight children attended school.
Nettie later married David W. Yarbrough, described by Ardis Walker as “a wild and wooly cowpuncher.” She and Dave shared the challenges of cow camp and cattle ranching until both Nettie and Dave slowed their lives a bit. They set up a wayside station (gas station) in Red Rock Canyon. Due to Dave suffering a series of strokes, they returned to Kernville where she cared for him.
In October 1950, The Ancient and Honorable Order of E Clampus Vitus convened to commemorate the old town of Kernville before it was lost to Lake Isabella, placing a plaque just outside the Old Kernville Cemetery. Nettie & husband David are shown here at that time just outside this historic cemetery fence.
The Clampers selected Nettie as the epitome of the pioneer spirit of the old town and conferred upon her the distinction of becoming an Honorary Clamp Widow.
Nettie took great pleasure in the recognition and in writing friends; she would add “Nettie Hight Yarbrough, Grand Honorary Widow No. 1 of Whiskey Flat” to the letterhead and sign it “Your old E Clampus Vitus Gal, Nettie.”
Cora Nettie Hight Yarbrough died in 1956.
The Old Kernville Historic Cemetery Tour was researched and created by Kern River Valley Historical Society members Jenny Hanley, and Richard Rowe as part of the 2010 Kern River Valley Historical Society Annual History Days, celebrating the history of the Kern River Valley.
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