Bishop and the Owens Valley
By Mike Cheuvront
The City of Bishop in Inyo County, California, was named for one of the first white settlers in the area, Samuel A. Bishop. Owens Lake was named for Richard Owens a member of John C. Fremont’s 1845 exploration party, which included Kit Carson and Ed Kern. Later, the entire valley became known as The Owens Valley (see First Settlers below). The Paiute Indians called Owens Lake by the name of “Pacheta” and the Owens River” Wakopee.”
In size, Inyo County is today the second largest county in California, with a population of slightly over 17,000 residents. The county is so big that several eastern states put together would fit neatly within its boundaries. Inyo County contains both the highest and lowest points in the contiguous United States: Mt. Whitney, 14,505 feet above sea level, and Badwater in Death Valley, -282 feet below sea level. A difference of nearly 15,000 feet.
The “Inyo” in Inyo County is commonly believed to be a Paiute word meaning “dwelling place of the great spirit,” although some scholars are now convinced that it is a mistranslation of the word ” Indio,” Spanish for Indian. It is possible that the Paiute were trying to explain to the earliest English-speaking settlers in the Owens Valley that this was their land by using a form of “Indio” they had learned from other Indian tribes, who in turn, had learned it from the Spanish or Mexicans, not realizing that not all white men spoke the same language. Thus, Inyo may actually mean “Indian Land.”
First Settlers
The first white American explorers in the Owens Valley of Eastern California included the famous mountain men Jedediah Smith in 1826 and Joseph Walker in 1834. This remote area of California had never been explored by the Spanish and even though it was shown as Mexican territory on early maps, the Eastern Sierra region remained unvisited by them. Present day Walker Lake in western Nevada, the Walker River on the California/Nevada border and Walker Pass in the southern Sierra were named for their discoverer, Joseph Walker.
The most renowned early explorer to visit the area was John C. Fremont. He was the first Republican candidate to run for President of the United States in 1856 and later a famous Union Civil War general. Officially sanctioned by the federal government, his 1845 mapping party to the Eastern Sierra included the celebrated Indian scout Kit Carson, for whom the capitol of Nevada, Carson City, was named. Also in the party were Ed Kern for whom Kern County, California was named, and Richard Owens, who gave his name to the Owens Lake near Lone Pine and later the Owens Valley itself. Fremont lost a cannon that he had brought along in case of Indian attacks somewhere near present day Bridgeport, California (about 80 miles north of Bishop). Perhaps someone will stumble across the rusty old cannon someday.
The City of Bishop came into being due to the need for beef in a booming mining camp some eighty miles to the north, Aurora , Nevada, (Aurora was believed to be on the California side of the border at that time and was the county seat of Mono County, California). In 1861 cattlemen drove herds of cattle some three hundred miles from the great San Joaquin Valley of California, through the southern Sierra at Walker Pass, up the Owens Valley, and then through Adobe Meadows to Aurora. Along the way, some cattlemen noticed that the unsettled northern Owens Valley was perfect for raising livestock. To avoid the long journey from the other side of the mountains, a few of them decided to settle in the valley.
Driving some 600 head of cattle and 50 horses, Samuel Addison Bishop, his wife, and several hired hands arrived in the Owens Valley on August 22, 1861 from Fort Tejón in the Tehacchapi Mountains. Along with Henry Vansickle, Charles Putnam, Allen Van Fleet, and the McGee brothers, Bishop was one of the very first white settlers in the valley. The cattlemen were soon followed by sheepmen who initially struggled with a lack of forage for their stock in the area. Remnants of these early settler’s stone corrals and fences can still be seen north of Bishop along Highway 395 in Round Valley (barb wire fencing was not invented until 1873).
Establishing a homestead, the San Francis Ranch, along the creek which still bears his name, Samuel Bishop set up a market to sell beef to the miners and business owners in Aurora . One of the residents of Aurora at that time was a young Samuel Clemens who later gained fame as author Mark Twain (see Twain’s Roughing It for his comments on our area). By1862, a frontier settlement (and later town), known as Bishop Creek, was established a couple of miles east of the San Francis Ranch. Though the town continues to prosper, the only reminder of Samuel Bishop’s ranch today is a monument placed near the original site at the corner of Highway 168 West and Red Hill Road, two miles west of downtown Bishop. In 1866, the County of Inyo was established from part of Tulare County.
The Eastern High Sierra and the Owens Valley was the western most frontier in America at that time. In 1871, Daniel Bruhn was one of 41 wranglers herding some 3000 wild Spanish mustangs from Stockton, California to Texas. Their travels took them over the High Sierra and into the remote Owens Valley where they lost over 500 head of horses. The descendants of those mustangs still roam wild on the California/Nevada border just north of Bishop.
The Owens Valley
The Owens Valley, also known by its traditional name, Payahǖǖnadǖ – place of flowing water, was once a wet, flood plain where water flowed into and filled a large lake at the southern end of the valley. Much of the water that is produced by the runoff from the Sierra snowpack is diverted to Southern California today, but water still flows down the Owens River as it meanders its way down the valley. Along the way it seeps into the aquafer and terminates in large maintained ponds in what is now the dry lakebed of the Owens Lake. These newly restored wetlands are home to a remarkable variety of resident and migratory birds. This valley is one of the many rift valleys of the Great Basin’s basin and range landscape. The valley floor averages about 4,000 feet above sea level, flanked by the Sierra Nevada to the west and the White and Inyo mountains to the east. Steep granite peaks rise dramatically on both sides with the crests reaching more than 14,000 feet. Geologists consider the Owens Valley one of the deepest valleys in the United States. Spread out along the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada, the Owens Valley appears as an expanse where time has stood still. The vast landscape measuring 100 miles long and between 6 to 18 miles wide remains one of the least populated in the country. The towns are small, few and far between. The one major highway, US 395, dissects the valley north to south, threading through substantial plains of uncultivated lands that appear untainted by human interference.
The semi-arid and spectacular landscape of the Owens Valley is characterized as high desert. The rain shadow cast by the Sierra Nevada means the valley receives less than 6 inches of precipitation annually. However, this low figure belies the fertile capacity of the valley. Water courses down the mountain year-round to feed this valley that averages 92% sunny days a year. The geography and topography create conditions for each of the four seasons to develop and display their uniquely recognizable characteristics. Much of the land in the Eastern Sierra is publicly owned by federal agencies such as the US Forest Service, National Park Service, and Bureau of Land Management. A significant portion of the Owens Valley is owned and managed by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power and its vast, open lands are made available for public recreational uses. Together these landowners maintain millions of acres that cover deserts, plains, and mountains that are open and accessible to the public for extensive recreational opportunities.
