Our first stop in Lone Pine after getting set up at our campsite was the Eastern Sierra Visitor Center staffed by very knowledgeable national park women. Their information was invaluable, but what intrigued me was the displays for various counties in the southern district of the Eastern Sierras. Knowing nothing about this area, I was struck by how Lone Pine is connected to Los Angeles because it’s only about 200 miles away. The view outside of the visitor center is what we’re going to talk about in this post.
First a little bit about the valley we’re in, which is huge. The valley is between the Sierra Nevada mountain range on the west and the White Mountains and Inyo Mountains on the east. The mountain peaks on either side reach above 14,000 feet in elevation, while the floor of the Owens Valley is about 4000 feet, making it one of the deepest in the United States. The valley is 75 miles long north to south.
Up until 1913 the southern part of the valley was filled with water from melted snow in the Sierras through Owens River to form Owens Lake. It was up to 12 miles long, 8 miles wide, with a depth of 23-50 feet. It covered an area of up to 108 square miles. Yes it was large. Products mined from nearby Keeler, California, were transported by steamships on the lake to the railroad lines.
So what happened?
In the early 1900s, William Mulholland (of Mulholland Drive fame) and some other city officials decided Los Angeles needed a new water supply, and the mayor saw the Owens River and saw its potential. President Roosevelt thought this was a good idea because Los Angeles was such a large population area.
So Los Angeles started buying up the area and many valley residents thought the City should own it all. An aqueduct was built and water was diverted south, emptying out Owens Lake but making many in the area wealthy because of selling their land.
Eventually Los Angeles wanted more and more of the water, and residents in Lone Pine started to push back because of the dust storms in their area. The courts got involved.
Here’s some info on the original aqueduct.
Don’t know how you feel about this transfer of water resources from one place to another; I’m not sure how I feel about it either. I am glad that the City of Los Angeles has helped to correct the problem from dust storms that Lone Pine was having. Currently Wikipedia states that as of 2013, this dry lake is the largest single source of dust pollution in the United States.
movies filmed around Owens Lake
On a happier note, movies filmed around Owens Lake are Western Ho! with John Wayne in 1935, Maverick with Mel Gibson in 1994, and Nevada Smith with Steve McQueen in 1966 (plus more). Other films with scene shots at Owens Lake are Top Gun with Tom Cruise in 1986, and Tremors with Kevin Bacon in 1990.
Additional displays at the visitor center
Diaz Lake is just outside of Lone Pine. Went from a cattle ranch to a campground with a lake for water-skiing and swimming in the blink of an eye.
The Sierra is actually a series of nearly 150 mountain ranges and valleys across Nevada and Utah along north-south fault lines.
