HISTORICAL SOCIETY

OF THE UPPER MOJAVE DESERT

VOL. 13 NO. 4 APRIL 21, 1998

APRIL SPEAKER: LEARN ABOUT INYO CHARCOAL CAMPS

This month HSUMD member Tom Chapman offers us an opportunity to glimpse a fascinating aspect of local history as he speaks about the early woodcutting activities and charcoal camps connected with mining in the Southern Inyo Mountains.

Our meeting will be in the Maturango Museum on Tuesday, April 21, at 7:30 p.m. As always, refreshments will be served, and the public is invited.

Tom will show slides and artifacts he's collected to illustrate his talk.

This is not the first time the Historical Society has been the beneficiary of Tom's interest in local history. Recently he showed milk bottles and other bottles - including one holding Coso Hot Springs mud - in the vestibule of the museum.

Tom was born in Ridgecrest Community Hospital and he has spent his entire life in the Indian Wells and Owens Valleys. And for nearly that whole time he's been collecting items of local interest. For example, he remembers going arrowhead hunting in the El Pasos with his dad when he was only 4 or 5 years old. "I had a coin collection when I was young that I sold in 1979 to get the money for the down payment for my first property," he said. In addition to coins, bottles, and mining artifacts, Tom collects early Auto Club road signs. "I collect only local stuff," he said. "Practically everything I own is somehow connected to this area."

After Tom's talk, we plan on installing some of his woodcutters' artifacts in one of our vestibule cases so that you'll have a chance to inspect them at your leisure.

LATEST DONATIONS TO SOCIETY'S HISTORICAL FILES:

Recent donations to the Historical Society include sketches by Francilu Hansen and L. Englelbratson of the Randsburg area from Larry and Bette Fox.

Photos of one of the Adopt-a-Cabin choices from BLM under consideration by the Board from Fred Weals.

From Katy Bell - framed architects' drawing of the Radiograph Inspection Facility building at China Lake with many MILCON books on China Lake projects and 50th Anniversary mementos.

Gladys Merrick donated many mementos of Indian Wells Valley.

RECENT DONORS TO VESTIBULE CABINETS:

Alma Dial and her son, John, in memory of her husband, J. Edmund Dial.

Chet Creider in memory of his wife, Vera W. Creider.

SPEAKER AT ANNUAL SOCIETY DINNER

The speaker at our Annual Historical Society Dinner will be Mary Helmich, Sesquicentennial Coordinator for California State Parks, who has worked for over twenty-five years to interpret and present California history to the public.

Her presentation title will be: California's Sesquicentennial: Use it or lose it!

The annual dinner meeting will be held on Friday evening, May 15 at Farris' at the Heritage. Social gathering will begin at 6:00 p.m. More details later.

UPDATES AND SUCH

Last month's response for copies of Desert Magazine needed to establish a reference file in our archives resulted in our receipt of 195 issues from two contributors. Thank you very much Bill Davis and Rod McClung. As of now we have 308 of the 534 issues. The issues still needed range from 1937 to 1947; 1955 to 1964; and 1981 through 1985. We are accepting issues from any year as duplicates can be used to trade with other organizations.

It turns out that what was expected (by me) to be a simple construction endeavor to erect the school bell (donated by the John Pate family) on the Maturango Museum grounds involves a construction permit for anything rising more than four feet above ground level. And then the desired eleven-foot height became a safety issue requiring the structure to be engineered to withstand an 85 mph wind load. Volunteering to meet the imposed requirements is Carroll Evans, Jan Thompson, and Fred Weals. Optimistically, the bell will rise and ring before the end of May.

Establishing the Bullion Road as a National Trail is receiving enthusiastic support from Lee Delaney, Steve Smith and Dr. Katie Wash, all of our Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Red Rock Canyon State Park Ranger, Mark Faull, indicated he would contact his superiors about the proposed project and personally finds the idea very appealing. Your Society's part in this project is to pinpoint the trail's route, (Bill Maddux, President of our local NARFE and a member of the BLM Steering Committee is helping to do this), provide historic documentation and assist in preparation of the necessary application to the State Historic Preservation Office.

Lou Pracchia

WE ARE WELL INTO THE NEW YEAR - DUES ARE DUE!

Is your Society meeting your expectations? Tell your Directors how they can improve YOUR SOCIETY. About 50 of you on the roster of 200 are in arrears on your dues. WE NEED YOUR MEMBERSHIP! Please RENEW NOW if you haven't already done so. An envelope addressed to our Treasurer, Fred Weals, is enclosed with newsletters going to those who have not yet renewed.

APPRECIATION

March turned up Ye Editor's turn to act as 'hostess' for refreshments! (The Board had earlier agreed to rotate the job when the appointed one was forced to resign because of health and other pressures.) A threatening dire predicament for those of you who stay afterward for refreshments and talk loomed on the horizon. By the grace of all that's good, however, Charlotte Goodson, Dot Gould, Hazel Nilsen and Bruce Wertenberger offered their services in the form of cookies, desserts, beverages, etc. and the day was saved. My deep appreciation to them all for bailing out a novice. From member comments, the refreshments were well received. Thank you, one and all. Ed.

NEW MEMBERS

We are pleased to welcome the following new members to the HistoricalSociety:

Ben Licari, Jack & Mary Pakulak, Jack and Linda Ferguson and Dan Tillmans.

MINING HISTORY TALKS

A series of lectures on desert mining history is planned to be given in Johannesburg at the Senior Center building. The first one will be given at 7:00 p.m., Wednesday, April 22 by Stanley Paher on the topic of Death Valley ghost towns. We, the HSUMD, are cosponsoring this event. All are welcome.

THE SEEP FRONT

Three hundred ninety-seven students, plus accompanying parents and teachers, have thus far this year traversed the History Walk in Sand Canyon. For willingness to serve as guides on the most recent field trip days, a very special thanks goes to Joe and Litha Mattis, Eunice Caffee, Lou Pracchia, John DiPol, Eileen Dietz, Clyde and Pat Hazen, and Susan Hueber. Hank Schuette and Lois Carr continue to be an integral part of the students' experience and are greatly appreciated. Two more field trips are scheduled for this Spring, Thursday, April 30 and Friday, May 1. On those occasions every effort will be made to pair up new volunteering members with guides who are already "familiar with the territory." So, please call and come along for an enjoyable day!

Charlotte Goodson

OUR VIDEO IS READY

You've been seeing references to this project for some time, and, like all good things, time was needed to achieve its completion. The result is a wonderful 37-minute rendering of local history from which we can all learn, as well as enjoy. The video is entitled "SAND CANYON STATION." It includes fascinating original footage of early aqueduct construction, particularly as related to Sand Canyon, and the intertwining stories of the people living there and in the town of Brown in the 1930's and 1940's. Telling those stories, both on camera and with historical photographs, are Litha Crowell Mattis, Hank Schuette, Lois Ramsey Carr, and Bob Ramsey. This is simply a mere glimpse of all that is contained in the video.

The creator of "Sand Canyon Station" is Mark Pahuta. In his interest in preserving on video tape this facet of our local history, Mark generously donated his time to the project. With cooperation from the Navy; he brought to this video all of his professionalism in video-taping. To him, as well as all the people mentioned above, the Historical Society owes a great debt of gratitude. We have a video of which we can all be proud! It will be a program presentation at a future meeting, the date not yet determined.

Your Board of Directors recognizes the educational value and potential interest of the wider public and is researching the possibilities for marketing the video. We will keep you informed of this endeavor and when it might be available. Charlotte Goodson

BEANS, BACON AND SPUDS

Beginning with this issue of the newsletter we will be serially publishing the story of a George Enos entitled, "Beans, Bacon & Spuds". They are letters the young man wrote his mother after he left home to seek his way in the world and were written over a period of roughly three years. This correspondence was sent to the Society's Board member and Director of History and Collections, Dot Gould, by native Californian, Elinor Monjar, of Reno, NV., who is related to Mr. Enos. The spelling and punctuation is as used in the orIginal letters. Ed.

Mrs. Monjar offers the following comments:

Sometime in the ending days of June, 1897, young George Barnum Enos left his family home in Los Angeles and with a companion, traveled by train to the desert town of Hesperia, California, where he started work at chopping wood. He was twenty years old and left behind his devoted mother, grandmother and sisters Dotha and Esther. His mother, Mary, and father, Eugene Enos, had been divorced for some time. Eugene was living in Washington, but still kept in touch with his only son, the last born of five children. Perhaps it was in a bid for independence, or simply in the spirit of seeking adventure that compelled George to leave home. It is doubtful the family was in need of any income he could provide. Most of his letters were carefully saved over the years and chronicle a period of three years of travel, work and adventure. Upon his arrival in Hesperia, CA, George immediately sent a postcard to his mother:

June 21, 1897

Dear Mother, I arrived here at 2 p.m. Am in good quarters for the present, am going about 10 miles out tomorrow. The wind is blowing a gale. So far I have discovered 4 buildings in the town. Will write full particulars Sunday. G.E.

Mary wrote letters on the 21st and 24th. On Sunday, as mentioned in his first correspondence, George wrote the first of many letters home (Monjar):

We did not come up on scalpers tickets. Hesperia is about twenty-five miles NE of Old Baldy (Mt. San Antonio). We are now in camp about halfway between the two. We have very close neighbors here, the nearest one is only a mile and a half away by the short cut through the woods. The altitude is 3600 ft. above sea level, there was three ft. of snow here last winter and a ft. and a half in town. This is the edge of the desert. The soil is very good but the great drawback is the hard wind and lack of water. This is good tree country. There is lots of wild buckwheat. There is no cactus here but the plain is covered with a kind of yucca which grow like trees to the size of 1-1/2' in dia. and 15 ft. tall. (Joshua trees). Most of the land about Hesperia belongs to the Hesperia Land and Water Co. who hold it at $100 per acre. The land out here is government land except what has been taken up as homesteads. the only business here is chopping wood. The city has two empty hotels, and empty blacksmith shop, a store and post office and depot and half a doz. houses or so scattered out over and area of several sq. mi. our provisions about as cheap as at Los Angeles as the man we work for hauls it from San Bernardino, 35 miles away by team and furnishes them to us at cost. (To be continued.)