HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF THE UPPER MOJAVE DESERT

Vol. 15, No. 5
May 2000

REPORT ON OUR ANNUAL MEETING

Approximately 65 persons enjoyed the Society's annual dinner and speaker Friday, May 5, at Farris' at the Heritage. The speaker, Dave Hook of the Kern County Board of Trade, gave a background on the history of early movie making and then described some of the movies that had been made in Kern county. He noted that the great variety of mountains, trees, rivers, etc., provided a wide choice of backgrounds for movies and movie makers. He
showed a recently made video tape with clips from many movies that had been made in Kern county over the years.

During the business portion of the program, Lou Pracchia, Liz Babcock and George Silberberg were reelected and Don Lane is the newly elected board member who replaces Charlotte Paulsen who decided not to run again. This
year's nominating committee will seek members for a nominating committee for year 2001.

There were several special guests this year at the annual meeting. Ray Arthur, head of the Ridgecrest Area Visitors and Convention Bureau; Doug Johnson, an HSUMD member who came from Houston just in time to attend the meeting and who is a major contributor to our archiving project; Phil Shaffer, a friend and sometime business associate of of Doug Johnson's as well as a retired NASA flight director who directed the moon landing flights!; and Lois Balabin, a resident of the "House That Jack Built" and hostess for our recent tour there.

MESSAGE FROM THE PRESIDENT

Those who came first.

Flakes of obsidian, holes in bedrock and surface scratching on varnished stone give evidence that humans lived in the Indian Wells Valley and vicinity at one time. Then came the parallel tracks indenting the land from the passage of wheeled vehicles. As populations located around the beginning and end of these tracks increased the demand to have a place of one's own resulted. Homesteading was one way to achieve this in places not otherwise occupied. And so, the Indian Wells Valley gradually became inhabited.

It was in 1894 that the first homestead was granted to Freeman S. Raymond on acreage that surrounded his stage and freight station at Coyote Holes. By the early 1900's it became known that water was to be found further east
and north in the valley and that agriculture and cattle raising was possible in this part of the Upper Mojave Desert.

Most of those who came knew they would have to learn a different form of making this land produce if they were to survive and receive a land patent for their very hard labor. By 1920 most of the tillable valley land had been filed on and quite a few of the homesteaders had a neighbor not too far away. A school had been founded and communities located at intervals along the railroad line between Searles Station and Little Lake. These
settlers, or Early Timers as they are fondly known locally, deserve recognition for their achievement as a role model of our American can-do heritage.

A permanent way to recognize their achievement would be to construct a monument citing this feat. What is your opinion?
Lou Pracchia

NEW COMMERCIAL MEMBER

The Society welcomes Farris' at the Heritage as a new commercial member.

COMPUTER ARCHIVING PROJECT

As indicated in earlier newsletters we have most of our hardware and now with the two grants we will be able to finish acquiring the software needed to begin the total archiving activity. Our earlier requests for volunteers for data entry have yielded several but we feel more will be needed soon. If you are interested, please contact Lou Pracchia. We are in the beginning phases of data entry and getting familiar with the requirements of the software before we begin to archive regularly.

NO MEETINGS THIS SUMMER

Please note that there will be no general meetings for June, July and August and that the next general meeting will be in September 2000. George Silberberg our Program chair is in the midst of developing interesting topics and speakers for next year's meetings.

Plans are in the works for a dedication on Saturday, June 3, 2000, at the Freeman Junction marker on Hwy 178 just west of Hwy 14.

This will be our area's first National Trails Day event. The American Hiking Society in cooperation with Rails-to-Trails Conservancy are the national sponsors. Please watch your local newspapers for updates on event
time and exact location. This is a cooperative project with the Ridgecrest office of the Bureau of Land Management.

GRANTS

The Board is pleased to announce the Society will be receiving two grants in May. One will be for a $1,000.00 from the Kern County Community Foundation and the other a $200.00 grant from the (WACOM) Women's
Auxiliary of the Commissioned Officers Mess. Both of these grants will be used for hardware and software to further our efforts in archiving our collections.

NOTES ON THE APRIL MEETING

At our April general meeting Jim Simmons gave a very interesting talk by describing early mining in the vicinity of IWV, beginning with the gold mines in the Lake Isabella area in the 1850s, then the silver and lead mining in Darwin and Cerro Gordo in the 1880s and mining activities at Panamint City and Ballarat on the edge of Death Valley and other mining activities within Death Valley, ending with discovery of gold in the Rand mining district in 1895. He livened this with anecdotes about some of the many colorful characters who were part of the mining scene.

SAGE BRUSH WHISPERS

Following is the third installment of an historical article about the Chambers' homesteading experience in Indian Wells Valley. On October 26, 1926, Irene Chambers wrote the following memories of their move to the
Indian Wells Valley in 1918.

The Chambers' homestead was located 3 miles east of Leliter and 4 miles NNE of Inyokern.

In the previous installments (see Newsletters, on line!) , she told of their decision to homestead in the Indian Wells Valley , their move to the homestead and their settling down experiences. Spelling and punctuation are as in the original.
Ed.

Mollie and I would get our home sick spells. But they never seemed to strike us at the same time, or we would have ditched the job. One day I went in her house, she was blue--sick blue. She said, "Irene, I believe we have bit off more than we can chew." I said," Yes Mollie, we have a good big wad to chew on, but just look what we will lose if we chuck the job. She said "Oh no, I don't want to lose the land. But I do want to go home. Wonder what John is doing? Wonder how he got his breakfast and if he watered the flowers and washed the dishes? Did I tell you what a mess he made of his washing? Put his old brown socks in with his good light shirts and poured boiling water over all of them and let them soak a day or two! Don't think he can ever wear them again. But he does keep the house really better than I expected.

Well, the children started to school. The teacher picked them up and they went in a machine. They made good grades and were not behind when they each went back to their schools in February. Of course Fred and Peggy would have their little quarrels and tell each other to stay on his own land, and not to cross the line. But this would soon be forgotten and they would be reading or playing with kangaroo rats, which they had as pets, to come and
eat around their feet. They also made friends with a little gray fox. He would come just at dusk and eat around our feet as we would be sitting on the sand.

Fred and Peggy would build big farms on the land and have trees out of the sprigs of green greasewood. Good, clean healthy work! Oh, if more children could be out with Nature to grow up with a clean body and mind! In
November, John came and brought us a new Ford and sealed our houses and got us ready for cold weather. Then we could get our Mail and supplies at any time. Before, we had to depend on our good neighbors of which I cannot say good enough things. True Americans and ever ready to give us help when we needed it! We can never repay the good people for their many kindnesses! We could never have made the grade if it had not been for these good people. One day we went to the post office, a card from Lee said Cecil would be there that day. But the train had gone and no Cecil. Would we go back next day to see if he came? When our good postmistress said she would telephone us when he came, we all laughed, as there was not a telephone in the valley. She said, well I'll signal you with a mirror." We went home guessing. Would Cecil come and how would Mrs. Seibenthal signal us? Needless to say at train time next A.M. we were all up and watching. Peggy and Fred on a high fence post.

We had only one train a day. We were two and a half miles from it, but we could see it as it came in and wound its way around the valley, going north. Yes, yes, the train is stopping! A man got off! "Oh is it Cecil! All of us held our breath or it seemed to for several minutes, when oh--oh--yes it was a signal right in our door! Yes, he was there! How we hurried to him! Oh, how glad we all were to have him for a few days. He liked and was much surprised that we had such a wonderful valley. He had to go back to work, so all was the same old drag again hauling water; going to the post office; etc. We would gather greasewood roots in barley sacks and carry them in for wood, and count the days when we could go home.

No doubt you have asked yourself why we wanted to stay and go through all this. Well, we can raise anything in this valley. Six cuttings of alfalfa and good fruit and not such a bad place to live after improvements are made. We wrote John we would spend Thanksgiving with him. Mollie had learned to drive by then. We started by daybreak out across the desert, but we had learned to take water, gas, and oil, matches and lunch with us in
case we had bad luck. If we did we were to build three fires in a row and someone from somewhere would see them and come to us. But we never had to build any fires. It took us all day to make the trip to Whittier, and it
was dark when we got to Johns.

I wish I could tell you about the good dinner he had cooked for us and how pretty his table looked as we peeped into the dining room --- big white, feathery chrysanthemums in the center --- red Jell-O with whipped cream and
a red cherry on the top of that and his silver all just right. We surely appreciated the good eats too. After a few days we had to go back on the job again, the days until Christmas, when we went home with Mollie again.
(We did not have money to go home on).

Then back to the desert. Time was slow! Could we ever stay the time out? But nearer and nearer. At last time was almost up, and John came for Fred and Mollie. He nailed the windows up and we put things away, for we would be gone five months. They hauled us to the station and the last we saw of them, Fred was sitting in the back seat with big tears in his eyes and holding Peggy's kitten that he was going to keep for her. But the coyotes
got the kitten.

Peggy and I got home at twelve, next day. My sister May, had our house all cleaned and a good lunch for us. That night the neighbors Cave us an old-fashioned Charivari, which me feel I was welcome back home. We all went
to the desert the first of July again for the next seven months. All were glad to get back. but we had our blue days. Margaret went to our daughter's in Riverside to school. Cecil had to go to Imperial Valley for his health
which left Lee alone to do his own cooking, etc., and hold his job at Holt's for twelve hours every day.

One day we heard the sad news that one of our neighbors-- a young and highly respected woman ha passed away. It was the first death. in the valley and certainly cast a deep shadow over all. It broke up their home--
the best in the valley. It was very sad and made us all homesick for our loved ones. We went to Sunday School and Church and met some of the beat people on earth. Then they had a school working, The men cleaned off the
grounds the women got dinner, and all had a good time. The ladies Club met every two weeks and had entertainments in the hall. And it was not so bad, only being away from our families.

Lee wrote that he was coming to visit us. We wished it would be hot, so he could see how hot it got on the desert. We got our wish. It was so hot we had to sleep out-doors. We spent the day in grapevine Canyon. A beautiful
place with clear running water, and only six miles from our place. He could only stay two or three days and all was quiet and lonesome again,

One afternoon we heard a strange noise. None of us had ever heard it before. When we looked outdoors there was a big diamond-back rattle snake under the door-step striking at the children's white kittens. I had just
set a saucer of milk out to them. We were all scared, and I was afraid to jump over the snake to get out-doors, so we tore the screen off of the window. I got my pistol that I had taken there for protection and shot once and lost my nerve-and told Mollie to shoot. She said she would not. But I kept insisting and she shot once. One of us hit it enough to make it mad. It crawled back under the house and sang all night. Gee, how scared we were. Yet we knew it could not get into our house.

Next morning, while Mollie and the children watched it to keep it from getting away, I went a mile and half and got a neighbor to come kill it for us. After that we killed several side-winders.

(To be continued)