HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF THE UPPER MOJAVE DESERT

Vol. 17 No. 10 A UNITED WAY AGENCY December 2002

HOLIDAY GREETINGS AND PARTY NEWS!

A touch of wood smoke in the crisp evening air reminds one of the holiday season. And, at 7:00 p.m., Tuesday evening, December 17, at the Maturango Museum, there will also be the smell of hot cider, fresh coffee and lots of holiday desserts to further the feeling.

Our holiday party will be that evening complete with a reading, a game, singing by the Farris Family singers, Christmas carols and of course, the desserts. As in the past, the desserts are potluck (please bring them ready to serve) but beverages and table service will be provided. Bring a friend!

CHRISTMAS IN RAND CAMP

Remember, this year's "Christmas in Rand Camp" will be this coming Saturday, December 14, starting at 10:00 a.m. Start the tour at Plum Cottage, the second house west of the fire station, Butte Avenue. There you will be welcomed, given refreshments and pay the $5.00 fee which helps cover insurance costs and goodies. A map will be provided to direct you to the rest of the houses open for visiting; several are new this year. At noon there will be an organ concert at the Catholic Church by Dr. Jim Vaskov, Christmas carol singing and a newly recovered story of Santa's visit to the old Randsburg School in Fiddler Gulch will be read. Afterward, lunch is on your own. At 2 p.m. you will be welcomed at (c. 1900) Rose Cottage for hot cider. There enjoy the winter garden with its old market doors.

ADVANCE RESERVATIONS ARE A MUST! They may be made with HSUMD president Bruce Wertenberger (375-2369 or Susan Hueber. Messages may be left with your name, phone number and number of guests in your party. Alternatively, you may e-mail the same information to: lorraineblair@hotmail.com

In addition to the houses and the downtown businesses, other attractions in Randsburg that day include an exhibit of Christmas ornaments at the Randsburg Museum and a photographic display by Bart Parker in the Opera House.

Bring your cameras and wear your walking shoes. It will be a day for making memories.
Lorraine Blair

SPECIAL HOUSE TOUR SPONSORED BY THE MATURANGO MUSEUM

An incredible collection of all sorts of "Americana," plus assorted goodies from around the world can be seen at a local house in a one hour tour, which includes refreshments, on Sunday, December 15.

To reserve a time slot, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., for this guided tour, go to the Maturango Museum. The FUNDraiser fee is $8.00 per Museum or HSUMD member, or $15 for a couple; $10.00 for non-members. You will be given directions to this very special house and collection at that time.

Our November newsletter lists some of the many items in this great collection. Don't miss this tour!

MEMBERSHIP RENEWAL TIME

Our membership year is on a calendar year basis, so on January 1, all annual memberships need to be renewed. Memberships are $15 per year per person. Checks should be sent to Mr. Fred Weals, Treasurer, c/o Historical Society, P. O. Box 2001, Ridgecrest, CA 93556.

Membership fees help pay for the newsletter costs, utilities for our office building, production of our exhibits and various other expenses. Please help fill our mailbox! Thanks for renewing promptly.

The HSUMD requests your help in learning about Dorothy Mills, wife of Frederick S. Mills. Her last known local address in 1971 was 409 Florence. Previously she lived at 306-B Groves, NWC. Her husband Frederick died in 1969. He was the son of F. J. Mills who was the Field Engineer responsible for construction of the Aqueduct Grapevine Division (local). Your society has a remarkable collection of construction photos believed to have been taken by Frederick S. Mills during the 1909 to 1913 period. Please contact Lou Pracchia (375-7385) if you can help. Lou Pracchia

We appreciate the support of our business members: 'Farris' at the Heritage, The Indian Wells Valley Insurance Co., The Swap Sheet and Granite Construction ­ Sand and Gravel. Please patronize these business members whenever possible. We also encourage any of our members who are eligible to become business members, to do so.

As noted earlier, we are running low on material to use as historical articles about early days in the local area. Please contact Bruce Wertenberger (375-2369) if you have any material which you have, or know of, which could be used in future newsletters. Thank you

We are pleased to report that John DiPol has responded to our plea and you will be reading articles by him after we finish the story on the community of Brown, but we still need more material.

WALKER PASS RESEARCH

Lou Pracchia, our immediate past president is hard at work on research about Walker Pass and why, for instance, the date on the plaque on the pass doesn't match with some historical writings, to say nothing about was that really the pass which Walker used the first time across the Sierras. We should be seeing the results of his studies soon.

"PIONEER OF THE YEAR"

The Historical Society is contemplating establishing a "Pioneer of the Year," or "Honored Pioneer" or "Distinguished Citizen." We are still mulling over the idea and would welcome your ideas on selection criteria and/or nominations. The purpose would be to give further recognition to those who helped establish the community. Please mail your thoughts to us at P.O. Box 2001, Ridgecrest, or e-mail them to: hsumd@ridgenet.net

(The following article is from material written by Julie Stayton in the 1960's as a class assignment. The material is based primarily on interviews and reference material. The article appears as written. The material which follows is a continuation of the article which appeared in our November 2000 newsletter. Ed.)

BROWN ­ 1909 to 1920 (cont'd)

A post office was established in Brown and the Carr's made the trip to the town to collect their mail. Their postal address was: Siding 18 - Mojave ­ Owenyo Railroad via Mojave. The Carr's also made their purchases in the town.

After Gus Haelsig, the store owner, passed on from quick pneumonia, his wife ran it until about 1913 when Mr. Fleming took over, then later sold to Howard Gill. George Brown had Mrs. Rachel Barsness as cook at the hotel Mrs. (Anabel) Carr tell us "Mrs. Rachel Barsness was an amazing person who managed the hotel and restaurant before the Diddens took it over in 1919. I'm sorry I do not know how many years she was there. Mrs. Barsness was the widow of a miner. I peddled farm products once a week to the hotel and many other customers. I was terrified by her, tho' she was never rough with me. Later she was converted by the Adventist Church people and became a lovable and good old woman and lived many years of her old age here. We helped to take care of her after she could no longer work, and lived in a box- car by the side of the railroad. I learned to love and admire her very much ­ her earlier years a victim of being born into a rough and rather brutal mining family." Mr. Brown, who didn't have much of a family, sold the hotel to the Diddens in 1920.

The railroad had a storage cellar in which to keep the supplies they furnished to their employees at cheaper prices than they would pay in the store. Prices were pretty high in the town during this time. The railroad hauled water in tank cars. There was a telegraph station here before one was put in at Inyokern. Mr. Carr tells one story of a miner shipping his ore on the railroad and the freight charges were more than he was paid for the ore.

There was not much left of the town of Brown when the aqueduct work was finished, except a store with a post office, a school, some railroad section crews living in the box cars, and a few people living in the hotel.

BROWN ­ 1920 TO 1966

By 1920, work on the Los Angeles aqueduct had been completed approximately seven years. Maintenance on the railroad had replaced work on the aqueduct as the primary reason for Brown's existence. Brown also provided postal service and a school to the area surrounding it.

By this time Brown's population had declined to approximately fifty, and as with most towns of this size, it's story became the store of its prominent citizens. The most prominent citizens of Brown were Mr. and Mrs. Earl Standard. As Emma Pierson, author of Kern's Desert expresses it, "Brown and the Standards are almost synonymous."

In 1919, the Standards visited Mr. Standard's brother Harley who lived in Indian Wells Valley four miles south of Inyokern. They planned to homestead in the desert because of Mr. Standard's health. They used a buckboard and mules to travel around in the valley watering in Redrock Canyon. It was at this time Mrs. Standard experienced her first sandstorm!
Shortly thereafter, Mr. Standard obtained a job as foreman of a maintenance group (head of maintenance-of -way) for the Southern Pacific Railroad working out of Brown. He came to Brown to train for his position before Mrs. Standard joined him there. When they arrived in 1920, they found Brown a town with a hotel operated by the Diddens, a store operated by Mr. and Mrs. Howard Gill, a warehouse, a depot, and various homes including homesteads and railroad and carbody cabins where the depot man and others had lived.

Mr. Standard and his crew ran a motor car and patrolled the track, maintaining the track by putting new ties, etc. Mr. Standard was very good in his work the the railroad often called him and his crew to work on the track anywhere from Haiwee to Searles thus making his work week very long. Mr. Standard finally had to retire after twenty-six years of service because of heart trouble. He died in November 1959.

Mrs. Ethel Standard was a teacher educated at Mills College in east Oakland. Because she stands less than feet, she became known by the nickname of Tiny.

On February 9, 1920, Tiny established Morrison School under the jurisdiction of Kern County Schools. Mr. Howard Gill was made chairman of the school's Board of Trustees. In December, 1924, the name of the school was changed to the Mount Owen School. This school should not be confused with the Brown School, first school in Indian Wells Valley, which had been located eight miles away in Leliter.

The first building of Morrison School was an abandoned aqueduct office building with a cheese cloth ceiling. The blackboards and seats from the old Brown School were used in this school. Tiny taught here with an unconditional teacher's certificate. Her students were Mexican children, aqueduct caretaker's children, homesteaders' children, railroad workers' children and Indian children. Children came from as far away as Little Lake. From seven to fifteen pupils attended this school until the Navy came in 1943; the attendance went as high as twenty-seven.

(to be continued.)