Jackrabbit Homestead: Artists, Off-Roaders, and the American Dream Writ Miniature

By Kim Stringfellow
KCET.org

Jackrabbit homesteads are only for folks who have a bit of pioneering blood in their veins. The land generally is rough, no water is immediately available, more or less road building has to be done. But fortunately there are many Americans who find infinite pleasure in doing the hard work necessary to provide living accommodations on one of these sites--and cabins are springing up all over the desert country.

--Desert Magazine, 1950

Beyond the proliferation of big box chains, car dealerships, fast food joints, and the nameless sprawl located along California State Highway 62 the desert opens up. Out there, where signs of familiar habitation seem to fade from view, a variance appears in the landscape in the form of small, dusty cabins --mostly abandoned--scattered across the landscape. The majority of the existing shacks, historically found throughout the larger region known as the Morongo Basin, lie east of Twentynine Palms in outlying Wonder Valley. The curious presence of these structures indicated that you are entering one of the remaining communities of "jackrabbit" homesteads left in the American West. The mostly derelict structures located among the occasional inhabited ones are the remaining physical evidence of former occupants who were some of the last to receive land from Uncle Sam for a nominal fee through the Small Tract Act of 1938.

One of the many land acts designed to dispose of "useless" federal lands from the public domain, the Small Tract Act authorized the lease of up to five acres of public land for recreational purpose or use as a home, cabin, camp, health convalescent, or business site to able-bodied U.S. citizens. If the applicant made the necessary improvements to his or her claim by constructing a small dwelling within three years of the lease, the applicant could file for a patent--the federal government's form of a deed--after purchasing the parcel for the appraised price (on average $10 to $20 an acre) at the regional land office. This highly popular mid-century homestead movement reflects the quintessential American desire to claim territory and own a piece of the land even if the property in question is virtually "worthless" from an economic perspective.

Although some cabins have been passed down from the original jackrabbit homesteaders to family members for recreation and other purposes, today the majority of the area's jackrabbit homesteads have fallen beyond repair, lending a ghostly and feral presence to the landscape. Others have found new function as primary, full-time residences with modifications, often referred to as "biltmores" by area residents. A small, but growing community of artists and musicians fleeing rising housing prices and general urban ills of the Los Angeles metropolitan area are reclaiming and re-envisioning the structures as artist studios or as creative retreats. Inventive enclaves forming within this geographically defined area are inspired by the Morongo Basin's spacious desert backdrop, its perceived tranquility, and a desire to form a sense of community within a rural environment. Many have migrated to the region with aspirations uncannily akin to the original homesteaders and share similar outlooks or values with them.

In their quest for renewal and reinvention, musicians and other artists have converged on this part of the desert during the past half-century for the creative stimulation that the openness of the place provides. Cosmic, country-rock music icon Gram Parsons, who frequented Joshua Tree often, died there; and other musicians, such as Tim Easton, Gram Rabbit, Ann Magnuson, and Victoria Williams have homes there.

Artists see the desert as a place of refuge and as a source of inspiration. Joshua Tree and its vicinity are home to a well-documented community of creative types. Bob Arnett, Diane Best, Helena Bongartz, Chris Carraher, Shari Elf, Perry Hoffmanm, Mary-Austin Klein, Jack Pierson, Randy Polumbo, and Andrea Zittel are some of the diverse group of artists living throughout the Morongo Basin and who also own cabins originally built by jackrabbit homesteaders. There have been numerous in-depth articles in both the New York Times and Los Angeles Times concerning the artists' presence in the area. Zittel, an internationally-known artist living in Joshua Tree, co-hosts the High Desert Sites, a biannual series of experimental, site-specific art projects, providing an alternative space for both local and out-of-town artists. Helena Bongartz employs the architectural structure of the cabins directly in her art, using the fascade of an abandoned shack near Amboy to project her video work at night.

Historically, the region has also served as a place to build alternative communities, including those of gays and lesbians. It is not known how many gays and lesbians settled in jackrabbit homesteaders, but there is speculation that some are believed to have done so. A long-time lesbian resident refers affectionately to her neighborhood as the "gay ghetto," a tightly knit community home to many practicing artists who have restored cabins into artist studios and very distinctive creative retreats.

As structures for the imagination, the abandoned cabins have become a catalyst for various human projections, where physical and symbolic constructions of space play out over time. If you look closely, you may also find that the cabins reveal a personal text that describes their former occupants in a much more intimate way. Chris Carraher, an artist and cabin dweller in Wonder Valley, asserts: "The homestead cabin is the other icon that figures this place for me. A pervasive relic of a small-time working-class fantasy land-rush, it is the American Dream writ miniature. Abandoned, ghostly, habited, or reclaimed, the cabin is a lone prop that sets the stage of this tremendous theater at the edge of civilization and wildness, a porous vessel through which the desert and human pass, and pass again."

About the Jackrabbit Homestead Project:

Jackrabbit Homestead is a project produced by Kim Stringfellow exploring the cultural legacy of the Small Tract Act in Southern California's Morongo Basin region near Joshua Tree National Park through a physical installation of photographs, maps, documents, and other related materials. Another component of this project is the Web-based multimedia presentation featuring a free, downloadable car audio tour component available at www.jackrabbithomestead.com. The accompanying book, Jackrabbit Homestead: Tracing the Small Tract Act in the Southern California Landscape, 1938-2008 was published in 2009 by the Center for American Places. The Web site and audio tour were funded by the California Council for the Humanites California Story Fund initiative and were released in March 2009.

San Bernardino County: Board considers new boundaries

Proposed San Bernardino County redistrict map. (San Bernardino County)

by Imran Ghori
Press-Enterprise

San Bernardino County -- Supervisors will take up a redistricting ordinance today but remain split on the plan, which has drawn criticism from some mountain and Latino residents.

The board approved a draft proposal on a 3-2 vote last month at its fourth meeting since May on how to draw the county's supervisorial district boundaries.

The new map shifts parts of the San Bernardino Mountains -- from Lake Arrowhead to Running Springs -- from the 3rd District to the 2nd District.

The proposed map would also move Barstow, Lucerne Valley and Twentynine Palms from the 1st District to the 3rd District and half of Upland from the 2nd District to the 4th District.

The county's consultant, National Demographics Corp., recommended the option out of five maps considered as the best able to meet different county criteria.

Changing demographics from the 2010 census required the county to decrease the size of the High Desert 1st District, which saw the largest population increase, while adding to the 4th District, which needed to grow the most to ensure the districts are equally balanced, according to county spokesman David Wert.

Supervisor Neil Derry, who represents the 3rd District, voted against the plan along with 1st District Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt. Both remain opposed.

Derry had proposed two alternatives that would move all of the San Bernardino Mountains into his district -- an option supported by a large group of mountain residents who spoke at the public hearings of wanting to unify the area under one district.

"The public has come out and spoken and been routinely ignored," Derry said of the plan favored by the board majority.

Board Chairwoman Josie Gonzales, who represents the 5th District, said she is satisfied that the plan is as fair as it can be given the different regulations governing redistricting.

"We go into the redistricting process knowing we're not going to make everybody happy; that includes ourselves, the supervisors," she said.

Gonzales said she believes the mountain area is better served by two representatives on the board instead of just one.

The plan also came under fire earlier this month from Rep. Joe Baca, D-Rialto, who joined a Latino advocacy group in accusing the county of refusing to create a second Latino majority district.

County numbers, however, show that Hispanics would have a majority in two districts in the proposed plan -- 57 percent in the 4th District and 69 percent in the 5th District.

The group, the League of United Latin American Citizens Inland Empire chapter, held a news conference to criticize the county plan but did not contact county officials, Wert and Gonzales said.

"I'm at a loss as to why they've not contacted me or the CEO," Gonzales said. "We'd be happy to listen to them."

Gonzales sent a letter last week to Joe Olague, president of the group's Inland Empire chapter, inviting him to submit the group's proposed maps. In his response, Olague reiterated the group's criticisms but did not offer its maps.

Wert said the figures cited by the group in criticizing the Latino population represented in the districts are false.

The board meets at noon at the County Government Center at 385 N. Arrowhead Ave. in San Bernardino.

Desert pipeline would send water to Inland Valley

Environmental documents for certifying the project expected to be ready within weeks

By Andrew Edwards
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin

Water providers serving the Inland Valley and other Southern California areas may be able to draw from a new source of water sufficient to supply 100,000 households if plans for a Mojave Desert pipeline pass environmental muster.

The Cadiz Co., headquartered in downtown Los Angeles, wants to build a 42-mile pipeline to carry water from a remote desert aquifer in the Cadiz Valley to the Colorado River Aqueduct to be delivered to the Los Angeles basin.

The Claremont-based Three Valleys Municipal Water District and the San Dimas-based Golden State Water Co. are poised to be among the agencies receiving water from the pipeline, if it is actually built.

"We're always looking for water in other places in case the big earthquake hits," Three Valleys board President Bob Kuhn said.

Three Valleys wholesales water to providers serving customers in east Los Angeles County communities, including Pomona and Claremont.

Kuhn said Three Valleys has an option agreement to buy the water if the project is approved.

Environmental documents for the Cadiz pipeline have yet to be released, although a spokeswoman for the water agency charged with certifying the project said this week they are expected to be ready for review within the next few weeks.

"We're still looking at releasing the draft environmental impact report sometime," said Michelle Miller, spokeswoman for the Santa Margarita Water District.

The Santa Margarita Water District serves south Orange County and has been designated as the lead agency for the project. Its board will be responsible for reviewing and deciding whether to approve Cadiz Co.'s environmental report.

The project could create the equivalent of 745 full-time jobs, according to a consultant.

The Cadiz Co. owns 35,000 acres in the Cadiz Valley, roughly 11 miles southeast of Amboy, once a stopping point for Route 66 travelers.

Cadiz and Bristol dry lakes - and the aquifer that lies below the desert surface - can be found in Cadiz Valley. The landowners currently use the water for lemon groves, vineyards and other crops grown on their Mojave Desert property.

But if Cadiz Co.'s proposal becomes a reality, the company would build a 42-mile pipeline along an existing railroad right-of-way to a place called Rice, near Highway 62, east of Twentynine Palms.

"Why do it? It's sort of like asking, `Why conserve?" said Cadiz Co. President and General Counsel Scott Slater.

The projected construction cost approaches $278 million over a two-year period.

The work could create the equivalent of 593 full-time jobs for those directly working on the pipeline and an additional 152 jobs at businesses supporting Cadiz Co., according to a forecast from Redlands-based economist John Husing, who focuses on the Inland Empire.

"I would guess they (the new hires) would be living in the Victor Valley or Barstow, given where the facility is," Husing said.

The project's $258.5 million second phase would require the construction of a parallel pipeline to recharge, or store excess Colorado River water in the Cadiz Valley aquifer.

Cadiz Co. hired Husing at a $10,000 commission to prepare an economic impact report for the project.

The firm's executives have yet to release the proposal's draft environmental impact report. It is set to be released this summer.

Two ways of life collide in Wonder Valley

OUT THERE

Solitude reigns in the desert community until the off-road vehicles roar in. Then the tension escalates and tempers flare.

Al Gartner of the 29 Palms Historical Society inspects the remains of an adobe house at the Poste Homestead Natural and Historic Area. Preservationists say the area was damaged by off-road vehicle enthusiasts over the Thanksgiving weekend. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

By David Kelly
Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Wonder Valley - Eric Hamburg bought a house in this valley of wrinkled mountains and sugar-soft sand to escape life in Los Angeles and drink in the empty solitude only the desert can provide.

"I loved the peace and quiet. I loved the tremendous sky. I loved the heat in the summer," he enthused about his remote getaway outside Twentynine Palms. "It was like a safety valve for me."

But he quickly became aware of another way of life, one far less conducive to quiet meditation.

"You see them buzzing around all the time and they just come closer and closer," he said of the men, women and children who blast joyously through the desert on rattling dirt bikes and quad runners.

Some own homes in Wonder Valley, just as Hamburg does. But John McEntire's idea of a good time is charging about in a dune buggy exploring old mines.

"It's been a lifestyle for us," said the 73-year-old outdoorsman. "I bought the place in 1979 so my family could ride on established trails. We go out, pick a lunch spot and make sure we leave no trash behind. I enjoy the camaraderie."

As desert communities go, Wonder Valley is the real thing, an eclectic array of artists, retirees, certified desert rats and second homeowners. There are no strip malls, fast-food joints or other signs of homogenized America.

Houses are cheap and often come with five-acre lots. The dirt roads -- and they're nearly all dirt -- slice through a confusing hodgepodge of private land and Bureau of Land Management property.

Because the place attracts seekers of all kinds, there's a natural tension. But lately it's escalated into intimidation, threats and accusations of vandalism.

Things came to a head on Thanksgiving weekend when critics said marauding riders deliberately overran a historic site that they'd worked hard to restore.

"We are crestfallen because of all the efforts and energy we put into this and in a matter of two days off-roaders destroyed it," said Phil Klasky, president of Community ORV Watch, a group dedicated to curbing illegal off-roading. "It's a culture clash."

Ray Pessa, president of Friends of Giant Rock, which fights for off-roader rights, said law-abiding riders shouldn't be penalized because others flout the rules.

"I have run into these guys myself. They have cussed me out and kicked up dirt in my face," he said. "But off-roaders take in all walks of life. A lot of them just want to feel the wind in their face."

He and others in the off-road community have scoffed at Klasky's version of what happened at the Poste Homestead Natural and Historic Area. They prefer to call it the Chadwick Hog Farm after its former incarnation, and have insisted that its historical value has been inflated to restrict riding.

"I don't think there was any concerted effort to do anything, and I didn't see a lot of damage," Pessa said. "I saw a lot of tire tracks and a small amount of trash."

The 1923 homestead is a humble site, essentially two low adobe walls surrounded by a grove of tamarisk trees. That's all that remains of the home of David Poste, a former miner and justice of the peace, credited with running Twentynine Palms' first telephone exchange.

A recent visit found tire tracks crisscrossing the sand dunes. Earlier in the year, volunteers had strewn twigs to trap seeds and grow plants. Most were gone.

"They did as much damage as they could. It was deliberate," said Pat Flanagan, resource advocate for the Mojave Desert Land Trust, as she examined the dunes. "That's where the kangaroo rats are, the seed banks and lizards. As soon as you get tracks on a place, it's a long time until they are gone, sometimes years."

San Bernardino County Sheriff's Deputy Scott Andrews, who showed up to make a report, said, "We get calls for service for motorcycles and ATVs out here all the time. The people I see are either plain dumb or they don't know the law."

The Bureau of Land Management office in Barstow has seven rangers to patrol the 3.2 million acres of desert it oversees in the area.

"As long as people stay on existing trails, then it's OK," said Mickey Quillman, BLM chief of resources. "It's just the fact that they drove off road into the dunes where there are fringe-toed lizards and animal burrows. It's a limited-use area. You can drive cars and motorcycles on the roads, but you can't take vehicles into the desert -- and people ignore it pretty regularly."

Johnson Valley -- with more than 180,000 acres the country's biggest sanctioned off-roading area -- is 40 minutes away, he pointed out.

Gary Daigneault, news director and owner of KCDZ-FM (107.7) in Twentynine Palms, has closely monitored the battle between the two camps. He sees blame on both sides.

"You have the 'jerk factor' of off-road vehicle owners who have hurt their own sport," he said.

"But I also think Klasky's description of what happened at the Poste Homestead was blown way out of proportion."

Klasky, a professor of ethnic studies at San Francisco State University who spends four months a year in Wonder Valley, is public enemy No. 1 to riders here.

In 2006, his group helped push through a county ordinance aimed at off-roaders that tightened regulations on noise, dirt and trespassing and required groups of 10 or more to purchase a $155 staging permits before assembling on any property, including their own.

Klasky said he was once punched by a man on a quad runner when he tried to photograph him on his property. He said he and others who dare to stand up to off-roaders are routinely threatened.

"I have been the subject of anti-Semitic hate speech and racist remarks. Last year my property was vandalized, but I will continue to organize and speak out," he said.

His biggest critic is Dan O'Brien, a hot dog vendor who runs Mustard's Last Stand in Twentynine Palms and also operates the Cactus Thorns blog, home to his sharpest barbs.

Sometimes he calls Klasky a meddling outsider and environmental extremist. He's also used epithets and referred to him as a tinfoil hat-wearing ding-a-ling.

"These guys came to an area that is rough-and-tumble and they brought their ideas of a desert utopia with them," he said.

"But people here are saying we have a desert lifestyle that has worked for over a hundred years. It's like moving next to an airport and complaining about the jet noise."

O'Brien, 58, denies his highly charged rhetoric intimidates people.

"I walk the line. I tippy-toe on that line but I would never instigate violence," he said. He sees off-roaders as an embattled minority.

"We feel we have lost the desert and now we are being put on these little reservations," he said. "We are starting to feel like Indians."

The battle is far from over.

The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors may remove the controversial staging permit from the off-road ordinance this month.

Klasky said he figures he can get at least 100 people to the board meeting.

Pessa, of Friends of Giant Rock, said he can beat that.

"I am going to flood that meeting with off-roaders," he vowed.

New group tries to head off base expansion

High Desert Star

JOHNSON VALLEY — A new group called the Partnership for Johnson Valley reports giving a presentation about the Johnson Valley off-roading area to staff at the Twentynine Palms Marine base recently.

The group’s presentation was prompted to news the military is considering a portion of the Johnson Valley Open Access as one option for a base expansion.

The area is managed by the Bureau of Land Management.

The Partnership for Johnson Valley’s presentation was part of an ongoing effort to exchange information with the Marines and show the impact an expansion would have on a diverse group of people.

The partnership identifies affected stakeholders as including land owners, off-highway vehicle enthusiasts, geocachers, historical organizations, mineralogists, equestrian groups, remote-control plane organizations, the film industry, other business groups and youth groups.

“The partnership is reaching out to all of the stakeholders who could be impacted by the expansion of the Twentynine Palms Marine base,” said chairman Harry Baker.

In a news release, partnership Executive Director Mark Howlett quotes one of the stakeholders as warning filmmakers would leave the state if Johnson Valley is closed to public use.

“Johnson Valley is critical to the film industry because it represents the largest open, unrestricted area in California where filmmakers can shoot 360-degree desert scenes,” Howlett quotes Sheri Davis, director of the Inland Empire Film Commission, as saying.

“Without Johnson Valley’s diversity and ease of use, the industry will simply leave California to film elsewhere.”

According to Davis, “Annually, Johnson Valley open-access represents 10,000 California-based film industry jobs.”

The original meeting with the military was orchestrated by Ed Waldheim, a past commissioner of the California OHV Commission who represented OHV interests in Sacramento for 10 years.

At the original meeting, a coalition of groups was asked to participate to represent local stakeholders. They were invited back by the military to give a formal presentation.

After their second meeting with the military, the coalition participants agreed to form a partnership and establish themselves as a non-profit under the California Trail Users Coalition.

Partnership leaders have been cooperatively working with the military and the stakeholders in an effort to explore alternatives to the proposed land expansion, Howlett states.

The partnership is led by chairman Harry Baker with Howlett as executive director and Wayne Nosala as secretary.

They are asking for the support of other interested people in the area and seeking new members.

Marines looking to expand base by 100,000 acres

By KATHERINE ROSENBERG - Staff Writer
Victorville Daily Press




TWENTYNINE PALMS — Bureau of Land Management and U.S. Marine Corps officials confirmed that permits have been issued to look into expanding the facility at Twentynine Palms — possibly by as much as 100,000 acres into Johnson Valley.

The land acquisition is part of an effort to become the nation’s premiere combat training facility, said Gunnery Sgt. Chris W. Cox, the public affairs chief at the Marine Corps Air/Ground Combat Center.

“The Marine Corps is looking at areas contiguous to the base, including the Johnson Valley, but no final decisions have been made regarding what alternatives will be pursued and analyzed,” Cox said in a prepared statement. “When the alternatives are finalized, we will inform the public.”

Permits were issued to conduct surveys of cultural and environmental impact, said BLM Chief of Resources Mickey Quillman, who is based out of the Barstow office.

While both Quillman and Cox warned that the proposed project would be still be many years off, Quillman conceded there could be an impact on Lucerne Valley, in at least as much as noise levels are concerned.

“It would be used for military training — a combination of live-fire and force-on-force training,” Quillman said.

Cox said that there is currently no training facility in the nation that can support the training requirements proposed by the Marine Corps, and that Twentynine Palms has been tasked with rectifying that.

“It is imperative that Marines receive the most realistic training before deploying into a combat environment that demands split-second life or death decisions. The potential land parcel additions would allow Marines to ‘train as they fight’ as a large-scale Marine Air Ground Task Force, in particular a Marine Expeditionary Brigade,” Cox said.

Quillman said that while the surveys are taking place, the process will require Notice of Intent — which will open the discussion to the public, through scoping meetings — and the proposal of alternative locations.

“This process of simply figuring out what land the base might actually need to meet the Marine Corps training requirements and how it affects other interests could take anywhere from three to five years” said Jim Ricker, assistant chief of staff for the G-5 training center.

That process, Cox said, “will involve a great deal of input from the local community and the wide range of stakeholders.”
Quillman added that of particular concern are the off-road vehicle community and proposed solar projects.

Off-roaders taking on the Marines

Enthusiasts prize site of potential training ground


By Michael Gardner
Union-Tribune


SACRAMENTO – California's off-road riders have launched an aggressive campaign to oppose any move by the Marines to annex Johnson Valley, a nationally acclaimed high-desert recreation area on the perimeter of an important military base at Twentynine Palms.


Rock crawling the "Hammers"

The potential expansion of the battlefield training ground for troops being deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan has sparked a conflict between the traditionally conservative off-road community and the military.

It also may pressure Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Alpine, a former Army Ranger and outspoken advocate for the military, to choose between his loyalties to the Marine Corps and to longtime off-road allies alarmed over shrinking legal places to ride.

“We're pretty devastated,” said Ed Stovin, president of the San Diego Off-Road Coalition. “It's hard to fight national security when you're at war, but you sure hate to lose the area.”

Stovin said he hopes the off-road community can work with Hunter on a compromise, perhaps pushing the Marines to consider taking land not used for off-roading. “He's a good friend of ours,” Stovin said.

Hunter has not taken sides, said Joe Kasper, a spokesman. “Congressman Hunter supports both the interests of the off-roading community and the potential expansion of the facility to better simulate and prepare our Marines for conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan,” Kasper said.

Hunter plans to address the issue at a meeting with off-road enthusiasts March 22.

Off-roading is a booming sport, with nearly 1 million vehicles registered in California to take to the terrain. About 4 million people ride in state parks set aside for that use, and countless others use federal land.

Off-road advocates say they are squeezed for space by urban demand and environmental-based restrictions.

Growing more alarmed as word spread of the possible land requisition by the Marines, off-roaders this week mounted a four-hour “virtual rally” over the Internet in a show of solidarity. By their count, there were 1,495 messages posted and 33,976 page views within four hours.

Many posts carried a common theme: admiration for troops, hopes that they return home safely and support for the military – but near-unanimous opposition to turning the valley over to the Marines.

“The Marine Corps has a need, but the off-road community also has needs and rights to enjoy and recreate in this well-established off-highway vehicle area,” Philip Hall of National City wrote.
“If this land were unused and dormant, it would be a different situation all together,” Hall's post continued. “But Johnson Valley OHV area already has a purpose and is owned by thousands of tax-paying citizens like myself who are not willing to sacrifice such a pristine locale to be turned into a practice war ground.”

The Marine Corps has issued a statement confirming that it is looking to expand training facilities, but it says no decision has been reached and urges patience.

“This process of simply figuring out what land the base might actually need to meet the Marine Corps training requirements and how it affects other interests could take anywhere from three to five years,” said Jim Ricker, assistant chief of staff at the Twentynine Palms base.

The statement continued: “It is imperative that the Marines receive the most realistic training before deploying into a combat environment that demands split second life or death decisions.”

The 140,000-acre off-highway vehicle area, located southeast of Barstow in San Bernardino County, also is home to the federally protected desert tortoise, a fact that could provoke strident opposition from environmentalists.

Protecting the tortoise was a key issue when the Army expanded training facilities near Fort Irwin a few years ago.

Johnson Valley is under the supervision of the U.S. Bureau of Land Management. Mike Pool, California's BLM director, is expected to attend Hunter's March 22 meeting with off-road enthusiasts.

John Dearing, a BLM spokesman, said the military followed a regular process before taking other federal lands.

“We have not yet received an application from the Marines,” said Dearing, referring specific questions about Johnson Valley to the military.

The Marine Corps said it plans to prepare an environmental review of alternatives once a decision is made. It promises full disclosure and public participation.

Johnson Valley is nationally known as “the Hammers” – one of the best four-wheeling, boulder-hopping areas in the country, off-roaders say.

The off-roading mecca draws thousands every year to numerous organized events, including rock-racing, rock-crawling and a “King of the Hammers” championship each February. The area's landscape is dotted with Joshua trees, steep red-rock mountains and sandy washes.

Losing the Hammers, one Internet posting read, “would be like baseball losing Wrigley Field or golf losing Augusta.”

Off-road meeting
When: 9 to 11 a.m. March 22.
Where: Cuyamaca College Student Center, 900 Rancho San Diego Parkway, El Cajon. Conference rooms 1207-1208.
Issue: Possible Marine base expansion into a Johnson Valley off-road area.

Wildflower Reports 2008

Week of
17 Feb 2008
DesertUSA



View from Amboy Crater 02/17/2008




The wildflower season is off to a good start with the recent rain in the desert areas. More rain is forecasted for Southern California and Arizona.

The hot spots for wildflower sightings are Southern California between 29 Palms and Amboy, CA and the southern part of Joshua Tree NP. Sand verbena is showing shades of purple in the Palm Desert and Palm Springs regions.








Sand verbena, Amboy 02/15/2008

The bloom has just starting in Death Valley and Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. Reports indicate that Arizona is looking good. Organ Pipe NP is blooming now.

See reports and pictures.











Evening primrose, Dumont Dunes 02/08/2008

Supervisor against plan to bring power lines to area

George Watson, Staff Writer
San Bernardino Sun

The county Board of Supervisors will meet Dec. 4 to vote on a resolution opposing a potential plan by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to install transmission lines through undeveloped areas of the Morongo Valley and surrounding desert.

At Tuesday's regular board meeting, Supervisor Dennis Hansberger said he plans to call for the resolution against LADWP's Green Path North project.

He made the decision after meeting with the California Desert Coalition, a nonprofit trying to preserve the desert. The coalition gave a presentation on Tuesday to three board members.

Coalition officials said there is another option for LADWP - using the 10 Freeway corridor, which is already home to transmission lines.

Hansberger agreed.

"I don't think there is a legitimate reason to cross this reasonably pristine area," said Hansberger, who represents the 3rd District.

The district encompasses some of the proposed area, which is primarily on federal land.

Randy Thomas, assistant chief operating officer for LADWP's Power System, said everyone is getting ahead of themselves.

"It's very, very early in the process," Thomas said. "Preliminary public meetings are not set for until January."

Currently, the utility is considering 7 to 9 possible routes, Thomas said.

The community's involvement is wanted, he said, to help determine the best path.

Under one of LADWP's plans, 500-kilovolt power lines would be stretched from Desert Hot Springs north, then brought around the Bighorn Mountain Wilderness westward to Hesperia.

The projected path is about 85 miles, and travels through such areas as the Big Morongo Canyon Preserve and Pioneertown Mountains Preserve.

"It's obvious there are other ways of doing this," said John Simpson of Twentynine Palms who is opposed to the project.

Hansberger said he understood the plan would save money for the nation's largest municipal utility. Using the 10 corridor would mean renting property, not buying it. But that's not enough of a reason to negatively impact the desert, he added.

Hansberger appears to have an ally in Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt, whose High Desert district encompasses part of the proposed area.

Mitzelfelt said it was unfair that the desert takes the brunt of the project's impact.

"That doesn't sit well with me," he said.

Marines give supervisor desert tortoise tour

Submitted by: MCAGCC
Story by: Computed Name: Lance Cpl. Jared J. Butler

MARINE CORPS AIR GROUND COMBAT CENTER TWENTYNINE PALMS, CA -- The Natural Resources and Environmental Affairs (NREA) staff showed Brad Mitzelfelt, San Bernardino County First District supervisor, to the Combat Center Tuesday.

Mitzelfelt plays a major role in keeping the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors updated with environmental issues, and spent the day learning how NREA works to improve the environment at the base.

Brig. Gen. Melvin G. Spiese, Combat Center commanding general, was the first to welcome Mitzelfelt and his staff to the Combat Center before they started their tour.

After the-meet-and greet with Spiese, Brad Henen, NREA ecologist, led the tour to the Tortoise Research and Captive Rearing Site at Combat Center Sand Hill Training Area and explained NREA’s involvement with the threatened desert tortoises aboard the base.

The TRACRS is a facility dedicated to monitoring desert tortoise egg production and disease status using cutting edge technology.

The highly qualified staff of the Natural Resources Section involved with TRACRS helps by bringing female tortoises to the facility pens to lay their eggs.

The TRACRS protects the nests and baby tortoises through their growing stages until they are large enough to become resistant to predators such as ravens, coyotes and ground squirrels.

The genetic, growth and bacterial analyses will also help in the assessment of the Combat Center population, according to the TRACRS information sheet.

“The TRACRS program is an effective way to save desert tortoises on base that the county would like to implement on private property,” said Metzelfelt. “It was very nice to get an opportunity to see it first-hand.”

Henen also explained the NREA involvement with Marines in case of direct contact with desert tortoises.

“The main focus is to keep the tortoises in the local area, but Marines occasionally encounter them in the training area,” said Henen. “Every Marine who enters the training area is made aware of the proper steps to take when they spot a tortoise.”

After the informational walkthrough of TRACRS, the tour moved on to the Range Residue Processing Center to learn about the recycling process.

Mike Quintana, RRRC supervisor, explained how used ammunition and materials from the Combat Center training area are reused.

“I was very impressed by the base’s recycling programs,” said Mitzelfelt. “It’s good to see the base takes recycling very seriously and they’re doing well.”

Mitzelfelt and his staff moved from the RRRC to learn about the base’s progress with residential recycling from Sue Corney, Qualified Recycling Program manager.

“We’re working to establish a recycling center on the base so Marines and their families don’t have to go out into town to receive cash value for their recyclable items,” said Jim Lessard, NREA deputy director.

The NREA staff thoroughly informed Mitzelfelt of desert tortoise protection and recycling to give the county supervisor a better understanding of the steps being taken to improve the Combat Center environment.

Tug of Wear Over Desert Homestead Shanties

Russell Scofield of the federal Bureau of Land Management visits an abandoned cabin in Wonder Valley. (Irfan Khan / LAT)










By Hugo Martín
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

The days of homesteading are long gone. But in the Mojave Desert, on the eastern edge of the ever-expanding Southern California metropolis, the sun-bleached remnants of that pioneering era dot the landscape.

Off Cactus Jack Road in Wonder Valley is a bare frame structure with a collapsing roof and blown-out walls. Outside, a line of red ants and an occasional darting lizard are the only signs of life. Inside, a vintage record player, broken and faded by the sun, lies near a dog-eared Bible on a bare concrete floor.

The shack is one of hundreds of abandoned structures in the desert, left from a time when the federal government offered small parcels of scrubland for a nominal fee to anyone willing to put down stakes.

As more and more suburban neighborhoods sprout up in the desert, however, the weatherworn shanties have lost their decades of isolation, and they're now at the center of a local dust-up. Some longtime desert dwellers see the dilapidated structures as eyesores and want them torn down, while a growing number of newcomers want to preserve the shacks as historic landmarks.
"A little empty shell that is sitting out there is a beautiful thing," said Perry Hoffman, an artist and photographer who moved from San Francisco five years ago to live in a renovated homestead cabin in Wonder Valley.

Beautiful is not how Bob Dockendorff describes them. The Yucca Valley resident helped organize a federally funded program several years ago to demolish the most blighted structures. He said some of the buildings that were razed were havens for drug makers, squatters and vermin.

"When you drove through the area, you got a bad impression," he said.

Dotting the Landscape

Such disparate views are common in the Morongo Basin, a 5,200-square-mile expanse of desert just north of Joshua Tree National Park. The basin is home to more than 66,000 residents and an estimated 2,500 abandoned homestead shacks in various states of deterioration.

Most of the tiny cabins are on 5-acre parcels that were deeded by the federal government under the Small Tract Act of 1938, one of the last of the government's homestead acts. The government's goal was to distribute 457,000 acres of desert that the Bureau of Land Management deemed disposable, most of it in the California desert. By the time the act was repealed in 1976, about 36% of the land was privately owned. The rest is federally protected desert.

Under amendments to the act, homesteaders were granted a deed only if they built a structure with dimensions no less than 12 by 16 feet. No water or power was required. The government was required to charge fair-market prices, but the land was cheap. A couple in Joshua Tree paid $125 in 1954 for a 5-acre lot about a mile from the nearest paved road.

The offer of cheap land drew thousands of applications from World War II veterans and suburban dwellers looking for inexpensive vacation homes. Several construction companies sprang up in the desert, offering to build cheap structures that met the government's minimum requirement.

A few homesteaders stayed and raised families, but many more abandoned the cabins, yielding to the desert's searing temperatures, pounding wind and fierce dust storms. Other homesteaders died, leaving the deteriorating shacks to their children, who had no love for the harsh landscape.

As development has spread into the desert, business leaders and government officials have begun to look disdainfully on the ramshackle structures. The basin's population has grown by about 24,000, or 60%, from 1980 to 2000, according to the U.S. Census.

Five years ago, Dockendorff and other desert residents teamed up with San Bernardino County officials to demolish the most dilapidated and visible examples, particularly those along heavily traveled roads. The program, dubbed Shack Attack, was funded by a $500,000 federal grant and disposed of 116 shacks. At the behest of program organizers, the owners of 335 other cabins demolished their structures.

"The worst of the worst were taken care of," said Bruce Davis, an aide to county Supervisor Dennis Hansberger, whose district includes many of the homestead shacks.

But the cleanup program eliminated only a fraction of the shacks built throughout the basin. Sun and wind have reduced many to sun-dried wood frames. Some shacks still have remnants of the pink or lime-green roofing tiles that were used on the exterior walls as a cheap alternative to stucco or wood panels.

"I think they are eyesores," said Pat Flanagan, the marketing coordinator for the Twentynine Palms Chamber of Commerce, who converted a homestead shack into a guest house at her home in Desert Heights. "They do give a bad image to the area."

Law officers who patrol the Morongo Basin say the cabins occasionally attract squatters and teenagers on motorcycles who throw rocks through the windows. But the cabins do not represent a major law enforcement problem, said sheriff's Sgt. Richard Boswell.

"We don't have an inordinate amount of calls," he said.

Still, the Bureau of Land Management has received at least 50 complaints about illegal dumping at the abandoned shanties in the last eight years.

Russell Scofield, the habitat restoration coordinator for the BLM's office in Yucca Valley, said the dumping sometimes included hazardous materials such as car batteries, which can contaminate underground water supplies.

"The main problem is that they are attractive nuisances" — meaning they attract trouble — "the same as an abandoned warehouse in Los Angeles," he said.

Consensus Is Elusive

Even family members living in the desert sometimes can't agree on what to do about the buildings.

Ronald Phenning, a carpenter who bought, expanded and moved into a homestead cabin in 1982, overlooking several abandoned shacks in Wonder Valley, considers the buildings historic reminders of a bygone era.

"As far as I'm concerned, it's part of our heritage," he said.

Phenning installed electricity soon after he bought the cabin. Over the years, he has added several rooms and a workshop, where he builds tables and other furniture. He must still haul in water from the local water district in a huge tank. An outhouse is a bathroom.

The cabins are also part of Phenning's past. His parents were homesteaders who built a 16-by-12-foot cabin near Joshua Tree in 1950. The family used the cabin as a weekend getaway where Phenning and his brothers chased lizards and organized tortoise races in the sand.

Phenning's mother, Marjorie, has fond memories of the cabin, which the family sold once the boys were grown. But she disagrees with her son, seeing blight in the abandoned shacks.

"They just look unattractive," she said. "Why don't they tear them down?"

In the last few decades, the Morongo Basin has become a refuge for artists attracted to the serenity and beauty of the desert. Over the last year and a half, Hoffman, the artist and photographer who moved from San Francisco five years ago, has renovated a homestead cabin in Wonder Valley with colorful tile, pastel paint and desert-themed artwork. He rents the cabin to other artists, so they too can be inspired by the solitude.

The shacks are not eyesores but picturesque elements of the landscape, Hoffman argues.

"I love them," he said. "They are part of the desert out here."

Christine Carraher is an artist and medical transcriber who bought a home in Wonder Valley 10 years ago and converted an adjacent homestead cabin into a studio. She said she favored the removal of individual shacks that draw neighborhood complaints. But she fears that a wholesale demolition of the abandoned cabins would ruin the character of the region and open the door to widespread commercial development.

"The day that this place looks like San Bernardino and everyplace else, I'm gone," she said.

Mojave Resentment

LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Los Angeles Times

Re: "In the Mojave Preserve, Emotions Still Run Hot," Sept. 26: The East Mojave Preserve is not the private elite property of the wilderness lobbies. The Sierra Club and Center for Biological Diversity have waged a campaign with their own exclusive agenda.

The new wilderness area closes historical public access to millions of acres of the California desert. Those of us who live in the desert and know the East Mojave resent the intent to exclude the public by closing roads and camp areas that date back to California's earliest history.

Jim Bagley
Councilman
Twentynine Palms