This boat launch pier points like an arrow to the historic site of Bidwell, which was located at the far edge of the lake at the base of the North Bidwell Hill. The old town site is six hundred feet below the surface of the lake. The north tower of the "New Bidwell Bridge" can be seen along the far shoreline above the boats  at moorage at the Bidwell marina. The distance from the historic Bidwell townsite to the new bridge is about one mile.

From the mid 1920's to 1960's the Bidwell's Bar area  became a locally popular swimming recreation site. The waters behind the Oroville Dam inundated the town site of Bidwell in 1967. The grave sites at the town cemetery were exhumed and relocated to other sites. The Suspension Bridge, Toll House and "Mother Orange Tree" originally located at Bidwell's Bar were removed and are safely relocated above the reach of the water of Lake Oroville. Today they are the surviving silent reminders of community pride that once belonged to the town of BIdwell.

The flowing waters of the Feather River brought gold to Bidwell's Bar that gave life to a town. Undoubtedly, it was beyond the wildest imagination of the residents of the town that eventually the rising waters of the Feather River, this time flowing in the opposite direction, would ultimately bring the final death to the townsite of Bidwell. 

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