Desert Dispatches...

Palm Springs Life Magazine assigned Christopher Langley to write a feature about the significant beauty that exists around this mysterious, little-known reso urce. Following editorial direction, the story focuses on the history of Lake Cahuilla going back to the Pleistocene, leaving out less savory details about the lake's current condition. The...

Our bone-chilling account of a week spent babysitting the ghost town of Cerro Cordo is the Halloween feature story on KCET-TV's Artbound. High & Dry is delighted about our long-term association with Artbound, Southern California's premier platform for arts and culture journalism. www.kcet.org/arts/artbound/counties/inyo/ghosts-of-cerro-gordo.html...

They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it’s night once more. ― Samuel Beckett Waiting for Godot No wonder Spiritualism, séances, mediums and visits with the dead took place in the dark of the 1800’s. In the days when the streets, houses and buildings were not well lit, it was easy to experience the night full...

He knows where he’s at now. There is certainty in his voice when he states emphatically, yet gently, “God is on the move here.” Gary Cartwell has a large presence, his beard announcing a patriarchal, almost Biblical, confidence that he knows about faith and God. He leans against the old wall of Austin Hall in downtown Trona. His wife of just a few...

It is 1:46 pm and 101 degrees. That is rather temperate by Trona standards, especially for the beginning of August. He is standing out working in the yard under a steel grey sky. There is smoke in the air. Is it from the Argus or Westend plant or from somewhere else? Both plants are belching rolling clouds of vapor. Benny Eldridge looks up with in...

First Day of Summer 2014 The Joshua tree is the sentinel of the Mojave Desert. It stands alone or shoulder-to-shoulder with other yucca trees in the primeval forest, waiting and watching, decade after decade. The Joshua’s true nature, origin and thousand-year life cycle are veiled in the mysteries of eons past. The human emotional response to an e...

High & Dry is fascinated by Robin Black’s photographic study of Owens Lake and its ecosystems. The lake is located just south of Lone Pine, CA. The photographer hiked the 45-mile perimeter of this now, mostly-dry lake exploring its history, surrounding environment and threatened status. Owens Lake was once serviced by steam ferries, but since the...

The myth of cheap fast wealth still drives the rush to the West. There are an epidemic of green energy projects supported by government incentives, expanding housing developments, environmental impact reports to be written, the monitoring for federal and state business and natural resource regulations and much more. The land is still open for econ...

High & Dry is thrilled that our project has been picked up by KCET's award winning cross-platform arts journalism program Artbound. Our Dispatch William 'Burro' Schmidt & His Tunnel to Nowhere is currently a featured story: kcet.org/arts/artbound/counties/kern/william-burro-schmidt-his-tunnel-to-nowhere While you're there you can sign up for the...

Mojave mining towns come and go. They burst upon the scene, prosper and grow for a few years. Then the mines play out. The towns dwindle and eventually blow away. Their ruins fill with ghosts. Their memory entices the desert enthusiast from the city to come and visit. Randsburg is one of those towns. Once it was the Queen of Rand District. It domi...

At five foot six, I am shorter than most people. That means I have short legs, always have. Getting on a mule for me is questionable. So when I start to get up on Blackie, a wrangler stands by ready to help. Luckily, I am able to scramble up onto her back, ego intact. Once I get my feet in the stirrups, the wrangler tightens them so I can push up...

Santa Barbara-based painter Patricia Chidlaw recently grabbed our attention with her vivid depictions of California landscapes. Her work includes evocative images of downtown bridges and rail yards along the Los Angeles River and desertscapes of the Mojave and Owens Lake - all areas of great interest to High & Dry. On closer inspection, I made an...

Trona shimmers in the March morning light across the salts-encrusted Searles Dry Lake. This company town is a beautiful if dystopian Emerald City. Condensed vapors from chemical processing pour from towering smoke stacks. Production looks full-tilt. The facts are different. The town is dying. One hears a death rattle down most of the residential s...

It is surprising how many people, when choosing a cemetery plot, evaluate the view. In Lone Pine, some people have their heart set on an eternal view of Mt. Whitney, the tallest mountain in the lower forty-eight states. I work with the Mt. Whitney Cemetery, so I know this happens. Lone Pine, on the eastern side of the Sierra, at the cusp of the Mo...

Most Americans who talk about the problems of “the desert” are talking about the Mojave. It is the best-known, most visited, and most studied of American deserts; but it is also, in an important historical sense, the most reliably typical of American deserts, the national standard… No wonder it is the desert of definition for so many Americans—stud...