China Lake Museum Foundation is grant finalist

PRESS RELEASE
Ridgecrest Daily Independent

The China Lake Museum Foundation was just notified that it was selected, contingent upon California Cultural and Historical Endowment board approval on June 10, to receive a $250,000 grant from the CCHE Museum Grant Program. The CCHE program is administered by the California Natural Resources Agency. The Museum Grant Program is funded by Proposition 40 California Clean Water, Clean Air, Safe Neighborhood Parks, and Coastal Protection Act of 2002.

Sixty-seven museum applicants applied for the capital asset grant program. The China Lake Museum Foundation hosted three state representatives for a site visit on May 3. Twenty finalists were visited and 18 museums around the state were selected to receive funding ranging from $50,000 to the maximum of $250,000.

These grant funds will be used in conjunction with existing China Lake Museum Foundation funds gathered through the Founders Program, capital assets fundraisers, memberships and special events such as the annual CLMF Dinner Auction.

The China Lake Museum, highlighting the great accomplishments to defense by our local base, will be making its first phased move off the base and into Ridgecrest this fall. The museum will be situated on Kern County leased land next to Maturango Museum.

Infrastructure including parking lot and utilities will be completed along with a 2,880 square-foot building which will house an information center and expanded gift shop. Some of the displays will be relocated to the new facility and others will remain in the base awaiting completion of Phase 2.

Phase 2 will be a 10,000 square foot building located on the same land. This will form a museum complex including outside exhibit areas. The China Lake Museum Foundation invites all interested parties to become members, work on the building committee or other subcommittees, become a building Founder for $5,000, or contribute what they can to make this museum in Ridgecrest a reality. For more information please contact Alice Campbell, president or Wayne Doucette, vice president of building at the China Lake Museum 760-939-3530.

A long road nears its end, as museum comes to life

LAND OF EXTREMES

Pamphlet from 1999 after the museum grounds had been developed. Photo courtesy of Neal V. Hitch

By NEAL V. HITCH
Imperial Valley Press

Over the next year, the Imperial Valley Desert Museum will be fabricating and installing a permanent exhibit called the Land of Extremes. It will be an exhibit on the human adaptation to the desert environment.

That is just a big way of saying that it is really hard to live somewhere that is so hot and has so little water ... but people have been doing it for more than 10,000 years.

Telling this story, in fact, has been one of the primary objectives of the Imperial Valley Desert Museum Society since its incorporation in 1974. Over the summer, this story will unfold in a series of articles that will be included in the Saturday edition of the Imperial Valley Press.

The Imperial Valley Desert Museum has been a dream for more than four decades. The museum in Ocotillo opened in March 2012 after more than 13 years of construction. Since that time, more than 9,000 people have come out to Ocotillo for programs and activities. In December the museum became an approved curation facility for federal archaeology collections.

Soon, we will achieve the dream of being a fully functioning and operational visitor center welcoming thousands of visitors to the recreational and environmental opportunities of our deserts.

To many people in the county, this has been a long time coming, but success of finally getting the museum open owes to the grassroots organization behind the museum.

The Imperial Valley Desert Museum Society was incorporated in 1974 to support the “promotion and expansion” of the Imperial Valley College Desert Museum, which had been founded in 1969. Under the direction of Michael Barker and Jay von Werlhof, both anthropology professors at IVC, the college operated a small museum in downtown El Centro. The museum was ahead of its time for the Imperial Valley, with an outstanding archeology program run by the college and a Carbon 14 dating laboratory, one of just three in California.

But in 1979, the downtown building was destroyed in an earthquake. I am sure no one knew the path that lay ahead.
Von Werlhof came to teach at the IVC in 1973. When he arrived in the Valley, there were 109 recorded archaeological sites. Over the next several years, he documented more than 10,000 additional sites.

Under his direction, the Imperial Valley Desert Museum Society managed cultural and educational activities throughout the Valley. The main objectives were the preservation and investigation of cultural sites that pertained to early man. The society promoted the idea that Imperial County held “the key to the antiquity of man in the Western Hemisphere.”

Sometime around 1984, plans were drawn up and a fundraising campaign was initiated for a new Desert Museum. And in 1987, an Act of Congress transferred 24 acres of federal land in Ocotillo “for the purpose of constructing and maintaining a public museum.”

In the early 1990s work began at the site in Ocotillo. Everyone in the county thought that a new museum was right around the corner. But there was a long road of fundraising ahead. In 1999, a federal transportation enhancement grant, in the amount of $238,000, was received to put in a parking lot, trails and picnic shelters. “It Used to be a Dream,” the society announced. Fundraising continued. Family pledges were made at $2,000, with the donation paid annually over 10 years. People were asked to buy a square foot of the new museum for $55 ... 1,200 were sold.

During the 1990s, over $350,000 was raised locally, all in small gifts. It was decided that the building would be “built as income allows on a pay-as-you-go basis.”

In 2000, Duggins Construction erected the exterior of the museum. Not until 2005, did the society receive a large grant from the California Cultural and Historical Endowment to finish the interior of the building.

The Desert Museum’s primary focus since 2011 has been the inventory and re-curation of the IVC archaeological collection. This prehistoric artifact collection is one of the most significant collections in Southern California because it documents the life ways of the earliest people in our region. When von Werlhof led students into the desert, he taught that people began living here 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. In recent months, an archaeology site in Jacumba was positively dated to 8,400 BCE (Before the Common Era).

The story of how people adapted to living in such an extreme environment is exciting. It is a story that still affects those of us living in the Valley today. In the coming months the story will unfold at the Desert Museum as construction of exhibits gets underway. It is an exciting time at the museum. Finally, we can truly say it used to be a dream.

Neal V. Hitch is director of the Imperial Valley Desert Museum in Ocotillo.

IMPERIAL VALLEY DESERT MUSEUM

• 1969 – IVC establishes Department of Anthropology
• 1972 – H.P. Meyers Foundation donates building for Desert Museum
• 1973 – Jay von Werlhof hired by IVC
• 1974 – Imperial Valley Desert Museum Society incorporated as a 501(c)(3)
• 1979 – Museum building condemned owing to earthquake
• 1987 – By act of 100th Congress 25 acres set aside for museum in Ocotillo
• 1994 – Spirit of the Desert sculpture erected at the museum property
• 1995 – Groundbreaking ceremony at museum property
• 1999 – Caltrans ITEA grant awarded for access road, parking lot, picnic shelters, and landscaping
• 2000 – Duggins Construction builds exterior of museum building
• 2005 – CCHE grant awarded to finish interior of museum building
• 2008 – Certificate of Occupancy received from Imperial County
• 2012 – Museum staffed and opened to public
• 2013 – Inventory of IVC archaeology collection completed
• 2014 – Design of Permanent Exhibit completed

Mojave Desert historian keeps California's heritage alive

Dennis G. Casebier stands in front of the library in Goffs, Calif., that bears his name. The railroad depot replica holds the world's largest archive of Mojave Desert history. Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times

Over the course of decades, Dennis G. Casebier has assembled the lost voices and hidden histories of a place largely washed clean of its past.

By David Kelly
Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Goffs, Calif. — Out on the great swells of the eastern Mojave Desert, that vast sand sea lying between Barstow and the Colorado River, there is no crumb of history, no tall tale, no arcane bit of knowledge too small to escape Dennis Casebier's notice.

"I'm fascinated by who ate rabbits," he said, sitting inside a library that will soon hold his life's work. "Did they eat jack rabbits or cottontails? Did they fry them or roast them? Did they grind them up or make stew out of them?"

"You see, that's the level of history we get into here," he said.

The soft-spoken retired physicist is a legend in this harsh land, a sort of Willy Wonka of the desert who transformed 70 acres of rock and scrub into the Goffs Cultural Center, his personal Xanadu of history and imagination.

In this tiny hamlet of 23 on the barren edge of the Mojave National Preserve, he and a group of volunteers carved roads and towed in ore carts, a defunct wooden post office, a caboose, windmills and boxcars. He bought a collapsing 1914 schoolhouse and turned it into a museum. His own Tales of the Mojave Road Publishing Co. has produced 26 books, 16 of which he wrote.

Yet none of it compares to his masterwork, the recently opened $1-million Dennis G. Casebier Memorial Library. Housed in a replica of the old Goffs Railroad Depot, the two-story, climate-controlled collection of thousands of books, maps, photos and tapes is the exclamation point on his arid passions.

Steve Mongrain, president of the Mojave Desert Heritage & Cultural Association, a nonprofit group that has helped raise money for the project, calls it "the most extraordinary historical collection of Mojave Desert history and culture in existence."

"There is nothing like it in the world," Mongrain said. "Anything that pertains to the Mojave can be researched there. It is unprecedented."

The association's 800 members donated $250,000 for the library, and the California Cultural and Historical Endowment provided the rest in grants.

Casebier, 74, has assembled the lost voices and hidden histories of a place largely washed clean of its past. The homesteads are gone, the mines closed, the tiny towns swallowed by sand.

Freight trains, some 6,000 feet long, still lumber through to Needles and beyond, but they rarely stop anymore because there are so few towns to stop in.

A 1920s picture of Rock Springs Land and Cattle Co. cowboys is one of about 108,000 photographs Casebier has collected. The library also has thousands of maps, oral histories and biographical files. (Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Times)

Gone too are characters such as gunfighter Bill Hollimon, who, when he wasn't shooting rivals, liked to pour gasoline down anthills and set them alight.

"The history is just everywhere, yet nobody is here. It's empty," said Casebier, an especially polite man who speaks with great precision.

"The people have gone, their life ways ended somehow. We are gathering the history of this forgotten land, and we have done so with a vengeance."

On a recent morning, Casebier rattled around the library, dipping in and out of the new filing cabinets. Each one contained dozens of subject files filled with personal histories.

Harrison Doyle?

"He's the oldest guy I ever interviewed, 103 or 104," Casebier said. "He was walking the streets of Needles in the early 1900s."

Llewellyn Barrackman?

"Former headman of the Fort Mojave Indians."

Betty Ordway?

"She was like the Rosetta Stone," he said. "She came here in 1914 and knew everyone and remembered everything. She knew the gunfighters and the homesteaders and where the stills were. She was the belle of the valley."

Tucked away in library cabinets are 3,000 biographies, 1,000 taped oral histories, 108,000 photographs, 6,000 books and 6,000 maps, ready for perusal by those Casebier believes demonstrate "an advanced interest in the desert."

Jo Ann Casebier, right, and volunteer Carol Brown sort historical documents. Thousands of soldiers were stationed in the Mojave during World War II, and many of their personal accounts are on file in the library. (Irfan Kahn / Los Angeles Times)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., consulted Casebier and used information from his collection when writing "Searchlight: The Camp That Didn't Fail," a book about his hometown.

"This book is better because of Dennis," he wrote in the preface.

Students working on master's degrees have come to study the homestead period and the military history of the region. Thousands of soldiers were stationed in the Mojave during World War II. Many of their personal accounts are on file in the library.

Casebier's own history in the desert began in 1954, after he left his home state of Kansas and enlisted in the Marines. He was stationed in Twentynine Palms and spent his free time poking around what is now Joshua Tree National Park.

"It was love at first sight when I saw the desert," he said. "It's different for everybody, but for me it was the wide open spaces and maybe the simplicity."

He returned to Kansas in 1956, got a degree in physics from Washburn University in Topeka, and returned to California in 1960. He worked on guided missile systems for the Navy and lived in Corona.

Meanwhile, his passion for the desert led him into the eastern Mojave, where he was smitten by what he dubbed "the forgotten country" encircled by the Colorado River and the I-40 and I-15 freeways.

There, he found an awe-inspiring emptiness.

"All the people had moved away. The schools went away. Everything went away," he said. "You would think that people would be swarming all over this area looking for its past, but they weren't."

Casebier's Navy job often took him to Washington, D.C., where he spent evenings at the National Archives and the Library of Congress photocopying records and maps about the eastern Mojave.

At one point he found a defunct wagon trail stretching 131 miles from the Colorado River to Camp Cady, east of Barstow.

Casebier formed a volunteer group that turned the dirt track into the four-wheel-drive Mojave Road. Soon he was leading caravans down it.

Chris Ervin first toured the road in 1988.

"It was a really fun, educational and a socially uplifting experience," said the Orange County resident, who works on the archives as a volunteer. "Dennis single-handedly rediscovered the Mojave Road and got thousands of others involved. He is an inspiration and a visionary."

In 1990, after he retired, Casebier and his wife, Jo Ann, moved to Goffs and bought 113 acres that included the old Goffs Schoolhouse. Working with the Mojave heritage association, he set to work saving the school and building the cultural center, which he donated to the nonprofit.

At the same time, he traveled the country interviewing former desert residents for his oral histories, persuading many to part with photographs and personal papers.

His disarming approach put people at ease.

"I'd say, 'So, how did a nice girl like you end up in the desert?' "

Some subjects were duds, but others, he said, were "bell ringers." He interviewed Curtis Springer 54 times. In 1944, Springer founded a spa and resort in an area he named Zzyzx, just south of Baker. A road bearing the name still exists.

Betty Ordway was another bell ringer. Casebier, who found her in Auburn, Calif., was so impressed that he put her entire 155,000-word interview into two bound volumes.

"She had 500 photos and she cast light on the big things and the little things," he said. "We had gunfights out here between ranchers and homesteaders, who would help themselves to a cow once in a while. A 1925 shootout killed two gunfighters, and Betty knew both men."

And she liked her rabbit fried like chicken.

"You could see her salivate when she remembered," he said. "I just loved that. Maybe because I'm such a nut or maybe because I wish I lived back then."

With his research constantly expanding and scattered everywhere, Casebier came up with the idea of a central library.

The grants arrived in 2006 and the building was completed in July.

Archival material is still being moved in, and the rules on how people can use the library are still being worked out.

Casebier, who still does oral histories, said anyone interested in visiting must make arrangements first.

"We are targeting researchers of desert history, those who are writing books or papers or scholarly works," said Ervin, the library's project manager. "Our focus is how do we make sure this thing lasts longer than all of us? We are trying to get an endowment -- maybe $10 million -- to pay for and support all these wonderful materials in perpetuity."

Back in Goffs, Casebier hopped into a golf cart and motored down his complex's Boulevard of Dreams. He passed a Justice of the Peace office that once served the towns of Amboy and Ludlow, and pulled up in front of an old library built in 1927.

There are hundreds of books inside that have not been moved to the new library just up the road.

For desert aficionados it's a small, if dimly lit, slice of heaven. Books with titles such as "The Great California Deserts," "Our Desert Neighbors," "On Desert Trails" and "Desert Treasures" stand in dark wooden cabinets behind glass doors.

Casebier likes to sit in the back room and read. If he should ever get bored, which is highly unlikely, he could open the window and drink in unlimited blue sky.

He has spent the better part of his life studying the desert. For years people have asked him why.

"I want people to know the tremendous respect I have for the human beings who lived here and the tremendous respect I have for their self-reliance," he said.

"They were a special breed. I don't want that story to disappear."

Volunteerism and Providence

Director Chris Ervin.

[The following remarks were made by MDHCA board member Chris Ervin at the dedication of the Dennis G. Casebier Library on October 11, 2008.]

My first inclination on speaking here today was to pull a “William Mulholland.” If you are from southern California you’ll likely recall Mulholland was the head engineer of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power in the early Twentieth Century. Upon completion of the 233-mile engineering feat called the Los Angeles Aqueduct, at a ceremony similar to this one, Mulholland pointed at the gushing water and said, “There it is. Take it.” This building is certainly no LA Aqueduct, but after sweating over something bigger than myself for so long, I can understand the irony, the sense of accomplishment, and exhaustion, behind those five simple words.

So I’d like to make a few remarks here today on the occasion of the celebration of this accomplishment before us. Having lived with the process of bringing this to fruition for the better part of ten years, I recognize the fact that to some, this building may appear to have merely sprung from the earth. Now I know, that you know, that isn’t so. But over a decade’s time, the highlights of how we got here may be a bit fuzzy. But have no fear, for I am here – to recap the good stuff for you.

We’ve had some major contributors along this journey who generously lent their expertise at each junction. The story of this building is one of nurtured volunteerism, punctuated by sudden spasms of Providence. That’s a theme here – volunteerism and Providence.

Doing things on a shoe-string budget, which is typical of volunteer endeavors, has many frustrations. But the side benefit is that the experience generates stories you can tell at building dedications.

Back in 1993, board member Gene Perry of Palm Desert, who worked for the Imperial Valley Irrigation District, made application on behalf of the Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association for the nonprofit status we enjoy today. That status is key to this organization’s ability to shamelessly ask for money and donations of your time and expertise. Today, that nonprofit status with the Internal Revenue Service and the State of California is maintained and kept current through the efforts of our long-serving treasurer, CPA Randy Kimball of Rancho Cucamonga.

When the Association completed its first large project in 1998, the restoration of the Goffs Schoolhouse, it encouraged us to think bigger, to think about what our next accomplishment should be to fulfill our mission of preserving the history of the Mojave Desert. We concluded that we should build a Library to house the wonderful collections that desert historian Dennis Casebier had been amassing for – well, forty years – at that time, ten years ago.

As we became serious about this concept of building a library, we were advised by our county building inspector that we had already maxed out the number of structures we were allowed to build on the property. It’s actually zoned as residential and it’s very difficult to obtain a zoning change. A better way of approaching it would be to apply for something called a conditional use permit. Basically, it’s an agreement with the County that would allow us to build specific structures beyond what is allowed by the zoning – like a library. This required submitting a plan to the county for approval. Perhaps this is straightforward if you know what you’re doing. But as a bunch of volunteers with our hearts in the right place and no experience with conditional use permits, we did not know what we were doing.

So, being novices, we asked around our membership for advice. One member who had lived in the county for many years told us it was easy. Just make application, draw up your plan on some butcher paper, and present it to the Planning Department. So we felt pretty good when we paid our $14,000 application fee and showed up with a drawing done on a computer. As we found out, the Planning Department is used to having civil engineers deliver plans – not desert rats. We were pretty much sent back to the drawing board.

About that time, long-time supporter and board member Carl Volkmar of Las Vegas, a developer and Land Rover enthusiast, unexpectedly donated ten thousand dollars at just the right moment so we could hire a civil engineering firm to do the necessary survey work, maps, and traffic studies for a lot split of this property using Lanfair Road as the dotted line for the cut. This was an improvement in our thinking in that it set the stage to allow the Casebiers, who owned this property, to split these 70 acres away from the 40 across the street where the Casebiers now reside. That felt like Providence to suddenly have the funds to obtain both a lot split and a conditional use permit at the same time. Unfortunately, Carl died of cancer a few years ago and is not here to witness this great accomplishment to which he contributed importantly.

It took about two years to get through the process, but we obtained our conditional use permit approval and lot split from the county. In all fairness to the county, it took us two years instead of the average six months because we are constrained by the amount of time and effort that volunteers can contribute. Many of us have full-time jobs and families, so volunteerism is actually a kind of leisure activity. It’s a labor of love that has to be fit into one’s life.

The next major milestone in getting this building in place was to get the property legally under the ownership of the nonprofit entity, the Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association. Dennis and Jo Ann Casebier exhibited great faith in the potential of this organization in 2003 when they donated these 70 acres and all of the structures on it to the MDHCA. It is a responsibility we as members must step up to. It is a legacy for us to maintain in perpetuity.

So time was passing by. Our conditional use permit was only good for three years and we still had no library. We didn’t even have a drawing of a library. It was 2004 and we had only a year left on the permit. Funding was the challenge. We knew we could not lean on our generous membership for the amount of money it would take to construct such a building in the amount of time we had left. We had no choice but to request an extension from the county on our conditional use permit. We were granted another three years, but that would be it. Otherwise we’d have to start the application process all over again.

We scrapped around for grants. But the majority of grants available for historical societies were for small amounts – if you call five or ten thousand dollars small – and most had restrictions that the money could not be used for new construction. We did have one brainstorm during this time. We figured out what shape our Library should take. It should take the form of a local historical structure – the Goffs Depot – which was torn down in 1956 and of which we had only photos. Historical documents were found by Dennis that described the dimensions of the depot. Those, along with old photos from the photo collection, and from several angles, were enough for member Roger Leggett of Kingman, Arizona, the structural engineer who oversaw the restoration of the Schoolhouse, to develop our first large format elevations of the new Goffs Depot / Library building.

But what about the money required for construction? We had enough experience with projects small and large to know we couldn’t cobble the Library together with volunteer labor only. We needed the experience of a general contractor to get all of the various components up quickly to meet our conditional use permit deadline. And, we figured it was going to take half a million dollars – far too much money to raise from our members.

It was in August of 2004 I received an e-mail announcement – out of the blue – that the state of California had loosened up funding from a public works proposition passed by the voters in 2002, which included $267 million for historic and cultural resource preservation. Best of all, these California Cultural and Historical Endowment funds could be used for construction of capital assets – a rare eligibility for grants. This grant program was a perfect fit for us and our need for construction funding. This opportunity felt like Providence. Dennis and I had one month to put everything else on hold and pull together a 73-page grant application. Apparently, the CCHE staff and board agreed with us on the worthiness of our proposal and allocated $500 thousand dollars for the library in May 2005.

You might still ask, “But what took so darn much time to get this building up?” There are too many mundane tasks to mention, but just to give you an idea, the conditional use permit came with seventy conditions – that’s seven-zero – that we needed to meet before we could obtain our building permit. These conditions cover things we take for granted in modern society; water quality, fire safety, sewage, hazardous waste, endangered species, archaeological significance, professionally prepared building plans, handicapped access, etc. Out here in the desert, we had to start from scratch on many of the conditions. We eventually overcame all of these challenges, but with volunteer labor as the method of getting work done, these things take time. This is not a criticism, just a fact that all nonprofits adapt to in order to get things accomplished on a shoe-string budget.

Now, I would like to take the opportunity to recognize by name, those volunteers who made a significant contribution to making this building a reality; Robert Botich and Walters Wholesale for a major discount on our 400 amp electrical panel; designer Paul Geissinger for a major donation of services for our professional building plans; archaeologist and board member Russ Kaldenberg and his wife Judyth Reed for our cultural resources survey and report; the Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association for the two acres of land this building sits on; San Bernardino County Fire Department for waiving fire plan check fees; wildlife biologist Larry Sip for our desert tortoise survey and report; and board member and president Steve Mongrain for arranging the donation of the Goffs and Santa Fe signs on the sides of this building.

Additionally, I’d like to recognize the leadership and labor contributed by our board members and the following volunteers who provided direct “in kind” labor that counted towards our $250 thousand match for the CCHE grant; Gail Andress, Bob and Dorothy Beal, Red Brooke, Larry Burkholder, Leslie Ervin, Dave Given, John Harrington, Sharon Holmes, Don Johnson, Gus and Stella Lind, Jeff Moffatt, Kristy Motz, Rick Nisbet, John Reiff, Kib and Shirley Roby, Jerry and Jan Sears, Ron Shepard, Tom Smith, Morris Swain, and Carl Weikel. My apologies to anyone I’ve left out. Together, these folks contributed 5,676 documented volunteer hours towards this building. We couldn’t have done this without your assistance.

Even with volunteer labor, though, these things don’t happen without vision and direction. Those all-important core ingredients are provided constantly and without fail by Dennis and Jo Ann Casebier. I cannot overstate the importance of their contribution; their generosity, and their faith in volunteers. In fact it’s more than what these words indicate. Inspiration may be a closer word. And Providence: it feels like Providence to me to have the honor of being associated with Dennis and Jo Ann, and learning from them.

Now, I’ve said a few times it cost a half million dollars to construct the Library, and that is true. But it is actually a million dollar building value-wise to the MDHCA. In addition to the half million dollars of CCHE funds, the MDHCA had to come up with a two-to-one match of “in kind” funding. The way we met that match was through various volunteer labor efforts in support of the construction – $250 thousand dollars worth of documented donations of labor and goods by many of the folks present here today. So now we’re up to $750 thousand. The last $250 thousand was achieved through a parallel fundraising effort among our membership over the course of four years to furnish and operate the Library once it was finished. Way to go, TEAM! So, there you have it – a million dollar building.

The dedication of the Library closes one chapter and opens another for the Association. Now we begin the process of furnishing the Reading Room, (already in progress) and consolidating the collections of the Mojave Desert Archives into this building. Describing the collections and development of finding aids are next. Fleshing out an operations plan and policies and receiving researchers are also in the queue. Those are the tactical activities we’ll be concentrating in the near future.

Strategically, the Association will be working on funding its endowment. An endowment that will generate the long-term funding needed to hire a professional archivist and other staff to operate this facility in perpetuity. "O’ Providence" – if you’re listening – here’s your next opportunity. Thank you.

Dedication Ceremony for Mojave Desert Library

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Chris Ervin
Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association
949-613-1528
info@mdhca.org

Dedication Ceremony for Mojave Desert Library

New Library Building to be Dedicated at
Annual Mojave Road Rendezvous
GOFFS, CA – October 2, 2008 – The Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association (MDHCA) will formally dedicate its recently completed research library that will house the collections of the Mojave Desert Archives. The dedication ceremony will be at 2:00 PM on Saturday, October 11, 2008 in Goffs during the 29th Annual Mojave Road Rendezvous. The dedication will include the unveiling of a bronze plaque, a ribbon-cutting ceremony, and tours of the new building. Desert historian Dennis Casebier, County Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt and Mojave National Preserve Superintendent Dennis Schramm are scheduled to speak.

A $500,000 grant from the California Cultural and Historical Endowment (CCHE) made possible the construction of the research library that is a reincarnation of the historic Goffs Depot (1902-1956) built by the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railway. The library is built on the grounds of the 75-acre Goffs Cultural Center, which also boasts the restored Goffs Schoolhouse, a National Register property. The new building is a state-of-the-art, climate-controlled repository designed to process, protect, and make available to the research community a unique, extensive and ever-increasing volume of gathered materials pertaining to Mojave Desert history.

The Mojave Desert Archives is the largest single collection of archival materials covering the American history of the Mojave Desert—a history rich in the stories of western migration and pioneering spirit. This unique collection, formed by renowned desert historian Dennis G. Casebier over the last fifty years, consists of more than 108,000 historical photographs, 6,000 volumes of published works, tens of thousands of pages of news clip files, 5,000 maps of the region dating from earliest times, 2,000 loose subject files pertaining to specific individuals and cultural sites, more than 1,000 oral histories, an extensive collection of old area newspapers, periodicals and pamphlets, and materials culled from federal records in the National Archives.

Goffs is a former railroad junction and Route 66 highway stop that has become a repository of historical buildings, artifacts, and lore relating to the Eastern Mojave. The Goffs Depot formerly stood at the junction of the short line Nevada Southern Railroad with the Santa Fe, the main east-west line through the Southern California desert. For about 30 years beginning in 1893, this junction connected isolated mining communities, homesteaders, and cattle ranchers to the outside world.

About Mojave Desert Historical and Cultural Association
The mission of the Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association is to research and conserve the natural and cultural history of the Mojave Desert region for the purpose of preserving and sharing these resources in perpetuity. This is accomplished through operation of a research center, library, and archives, restoration of significant structures, conservation of historic open space, interpretation of backcountry trails, and production of educational guidebooks and historical publications in concert with government agencies and people of good faith everywhere. For additional information, visit www.mdhca.org.

First CCHE reimbursement received

Report by Dennis Casebier

It was 32 degrees and clear at 6:30 AM and absolutely no wind. by 9:00 AM it was 44 degrees and the wind came back up. I believe the wind yesterday was the strongest we've had this season and it was right out of the northeast as it has a way of doing in the winter.

General Contractor Cordova and his crew arrived at right about 7:00 AM, coming today from Yucca Valley. They'll be staying in Laughlin through the week.

I met with Dan. Everything is on track. He said he'll be getting another lift tomorrow. He'll have this second lift for just one week. It is needed to focus the crew on finishing spray painting the eaves and installation of siding. There's no reason the siding can't proceed to completion.

Also Dan had a new roofing sample. Jo Ann and I took the camera over and shot a sequence of digital photos of the sample against the siding, roofing on the power house, and trim and have sent selections off to Chris to support his making the final selection on a shingle product.

A highlight of today was that we received the first reimbursement check from the California Cultural and Historical Endowment (CCHE) and the State of California demonstrating that the system actually works! Chris and Leslie Ervin get our great appreciation for administering the grant which culminates in the submission of invoices for reimbursement. We have another larger invoice pending and a third one will be sent in this week.

Well drilling contract signed

Report by Dennis Casebier
Tuesday

Chris Ervin gained CCHE approval to award the well drilling contract to Eagle Well Drilling and Pump Service of Newberry Springs. Into today's mail, along with a down payment and the contract signed by Dennis Casebier, went a map showing where the well is to be located.

Ray Ward of Eagle Drilling said he plans to get on our project about the middle of September. To meet a County Fire requirement, we're going to need water tanks for storing 10,000 gallons of water.

Thanks to John Harrington, Phil Motz, and Carl Weikel for the field work necessary to lay out where the well is to be located.

Good news for desert history buffs

Mark Muckenfuss
Press-Enterprise

GOFFS, CA -- Historian Dennis Casebier has received a nearly $500,000 grant from the California Cultural and Historic Endowment to construct a Mojave Desert Archives Research Library on the grounds of the 75-acre Goffs Cultural Center.

The library will be built in the image of the Goffs Railway Depot, which stood near the site from 1902 to 1956. It will house more than 6,000 volumes of published works, 700 oral histories and other material pertaining to the eastern Mojave Desert.

Library to house desert history

Mojave group gets grant for building

By Chuck Mueller, Staff Writer
San Bernardino Sun

GOFFS - A former railroad depot that six decades ago hosted thousands of troops training in the Mojave Desert is to be reborn as a library to house a rich collection of desert history.

Directors of the California Cultural and Historical Endowment have awarded a grant of $499,500 to build a library to hold the Mojave Desert Archives, gathered by Western historian Dennis G. Casebier during the past 50 years.

The archives, the single largest collection of historical material dealing with the Western migration and pioneering ventures in the Mojave, includes more than 6,000 volumes of published works, 50,000 photographs and 4,500 maps of the region dating to the pioneering quest for the West.

The collection is housed in various buildings at the 20-structure Goffs Cultural Center. The center includes the original Goffs School, which was built in 1914 and is now a museum, and a twice-moved dwelling constructed in 1927 that serves as a library.

It will take about two years to construct the library, which will be designed in the image of the historical Goffs railroad depot, which operated from 1902 to 1956. In the early 1940s, thousands of soldiers training in desert warfare arrived and departed from the depot, which was demolished in 1956, Casebier said.

The grant to the Mojave Desert Heritage Cultural Association, founded by Casebier and his wife, Jo Ann, in 1993, is one of 13 awarded out of 276 applications for funds through the endowment, supported by Proposition 40.

In 2002, California voters approved the Clean Water, Clean Air, Safe Neighborhood Parks and Coastal Protection Act, known as Proposition 40, to set aside $267 million for historical and cultural resource preservation.

Kevin Starr, California historian emeritus, said the endowment's mission is to document the contributions of the many groups of people who make up California. It also helps Californians to deepen their understanding of the state's history, its present society, and themselves.

"The receipt of this generous grant marks the first time we've gotten support from outside our own membership of about 800 people," Casebier said. "The bulk of the work at the Goffs Cultural Center ... has been done by volunteers from California, Arizona and Nevada."

Viewing the upcoming construction project, volunteer Chris Ervin said, "Now the work really begins."

Among the volumes in the collection at Goffs are originals of official reports of the 1853-54 Whipple expedition, which surveyed a route for a Pacific railroad across the Mojave.

"We also have the official reports and map of Edward Fitzgerald Beale, who brought camels to California from Texas in 1850," Casebier said.

"The collection includes everything related to the East Mojave, dating to 1850. There was nothing before that."

Casebier said the center acquired the volumes "one at a time and there is a story behind each one."

The volumes also include 2,000 loose subject files pertaining to individuals of interest and specific cultural sites. It also contains an extensive collection of old area newspapers, periodicals and pamphlets, and material culled from federal records in the National Archives.

"We also have compiled 700 oral histories," Casebier said. "We're constantly looking for volunteers to help us continue this important work, and are searching for desert old-timers to participate in our extensive oral history program."

Casebier, 72, a Kansan who served in the Marine Corps at Twentynine Palms for 22 years, later was employed as a Navy physicist working with guided missile systems in Corona. During visits to Washington, D.C., he frequented the Library of Congress and the National Archives, conducting research on the East Mojave.

After writing a book in 1970 about the Arizona territory, Casebier started Tales of the Mojave Road Publishing Co., which has produced 24 titles. Sixteen were authored by Casebier.

"In 1980, I started in earnest with the library collection," he said.

A year later, Casebier formed a volunteer group that continues today, called the Friends of the Mojave Road.

"We worked with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to develop the Mojave Road and other historic trails into the back country," he said.

For this work, Casebier and the group received the bureau's highest national award for volunteer service.

Upon retiring in 1990, the Casebiers bought the old Goffs school and 113 acres around it, intent on opening a desert cultural center. Three years later, they helped found the nonprofit, tax-exempt Mojave Desert Heritage Cultural Association to take over the property.

"In 1998, Jo Ann and I deeded the school and the 1-acre school yard to the association, restoring the school to its 1914 condition," Casebier said. "In 2001, the school was listed on the National Register of Historic Places."

The Casebiers donated 70 acres of their property to the cultural association in late 2002.

State Approves $500 Thousand For Mojave Desert Archives Construction

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

GOFFS, CA – May 23, 2005 –The Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association (MDHCA) has received final funding approval for construction of the Mojave Desert Archives research library. The California Cultural and Historical Endowment (CCHE) Board of Directors met on May 18, 2005 in downtown Los Angeles to review the status of 33 grant finalists selected last December. The Board's resolution to grant $499,500 to the MDHCA is the only CCHE grant awarded within the County of San Bernardino and one of thirteen to be approved out of the original 276 applications.

Funds from (CCHE) will support the construction of the Mojave Desert Archives, a research library that will preserve and present the collections of the MDHCA. The library will be built on the grounds of the 75 acre Goffs Cultural Center and in the image of the historic Goffs Railway Depot (1902-1956). The objective of the Mojave Desert Archives project is to build a repository to process, protect, and make available to our community a unique, extensive and ever-increasing volume of gathered materials pertaining to Mojave Desert history.

The Mojave Desert Archives is the largest single collection of historical materials covering the American history of the Mojave Desert—a history rich in the stories of western migration and pioneering spirit. This unique collection of archival materials, formed by renowned desert historian Dennis Casebier over the last fifty years, consists of more than 6,000 volumes of published works, tens of thousands of pages of news clip files, 50,000 historical photographs, 4,500 maps of the region dating from earliest times, 2,000 loose subject files pertaining to individuals of interest and specific cultural sites, 700 oral histories, an extensive collection of old area newspapers, periodicals and pamphlets, and materials culled from federal records in the National Archives.

Proposition 40 called for the creation of the California Cultural and Historical Endowment to support the “acquisition, development, preservation, and interpretation of buildings, structures, sites, places, and artifacts that preserve and demonstrate culturally significant aspects of California's history and for grants for these purposes.” To carry out Proposition 40's mandate, the Endowment will eventually distribute $122 million of $276 million in Proposition 40 funds.

ABOUT THE MDHCA — www.mdhca.org
The mission of the Mojave Desert Heritage & Cultural Association is to research and conserve the natural and cultural history of the Mojave Desert region for the purpose of preserving and sharing these resources in perpetuity. We accomplish this through operation of a research center, library, and archives, restoration of significant structures, conservation of historic open space, interpretation of backcountry trails, and production of educational guidebooks and historical publications in concert with government agencies and people of good faith everywhere.

CONTACT INFORMATION: Chris Ervin
Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association
info@mdhca.org

Golden Tales of the Golden State

By Dr. Kevin Starr, State Librarian of California
Los Angeles Times

SACRAMENTO — Amidst all the rancor and gloom surrounding the continuing budget stalemate, the cause of California history has gotten a boost.

Tucked into Proposition 40 was a provision authorizing $267 million for cultural and historical purposes. Gov. Gray Davis and the Legislature distributed half the money last summer. The remaining $128 million was intended for the California Cultural and Historical Endowment. This unprecedented and pioneering government entity — the Smithsonian Institution of California, it might be called — was the brainchild of Marco Firebaugh (D-L.A.) in the Assembly and John Burton (D-San Francisco) in the Senate. Their bill creating the endowment passed last summer and was signed by the governor. Then in May, Davis allocated the $128 million to the program.

For historians, preservationists, librarians, archivists and activists in the more than 350 historical societies in the state, the prospect of a permanent program, at the highest levels of government, devoted to the cause of California history is a truly exhilarating possibility. In one sense, the passage of Proposition 40, which included the historical funds, was a sign of the growing desire of the peoples of California — all the peoples in their varied historical experiences — to have their story told and, in telling that story, to assemble the larger narrative of California.

Thirty-four years ago, I completed my doctorate with an emphasis on the cultural history of California. There could be no greater contrast between our collective sense of California history — whether in the classroom or the popular imagination — then and now. The history of that time dealt with the Spanish and Mexican borderlands, followed by the Mission era, the Gold Rush and the creation of a predominately Anglo American state. While this history paid attention to literature, it was only in the first stages of acknowledging art, architecture and related cultural topics as historical forces. The stream of publications dealing with California was small but steady.

Today — thanks, in part, to a new generation of historians but also to the growing diversity of the state — the story of California has branched into dozens of directions. As befits a global culture, the history of our ethnic and cultural traditions has become a flourishing enterprise, as has the history of women in California. Historians pay closer attention to material culture and everyday life, to the role of technology, to education, art, architecture, gardening and landscape design, urban design and city-making, engineering and public works — and the all-important history of our environment. The publication stream has become a torrent. Equally impressive as formal scholarship is the rise of historical and preservationist activism at the statewide and local levels. We are entering, in fact, a golden age of historical awareness and activism.

Still, is it an exaggeration to compare the California Cultural and Historical Endowment to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington or the National Trust in Britain, or our own National Trust for Historic Preservation? Yes and no. Yes, this program will be dealing with large and important issues of cultural development. But it will be chiefly the peoples of California who will define, celebrate and preserve their histories. The Endowment must root in local historical societies and cultural groups that focus on the history and heritage of those omitted from the California story. It must see history, as much as possible, from the local perspective.

The program must be participatory but well-regulated, connected to the local level, where historical activism is so vital, yet adhering to the highest standards of statewide administration and statewide equity. But it must also be mindful of the powerful need at the core of the endowment. The people of California want their stories told, in their tragedies and triumphs, their grandeur and their textures of everyday life.

Such stories can be told through exhibitions in museums, historical societies, libraries, public galleries and similar venues. They can also be told through preservation in which significant places are set aside because they embody high and important moments in a group’s journey through identity. For some Japanese Americans, for example, the buildings in which Japanese American Army intelligence agents trained and worked in the immediate aftermath of Pearl Harbor — while most of their community was being rounded up and sent to internment camps — possess a deeply emotional and moral meaning. For African Americans in Los Angeles, there are places on Central Avenue that, though now bars or restaurants, embody the memory of jazz culture in Los Angeles and all that jazz has meant to the African American community across the decades. Caesar Chavez’s home is more than just another surviving California bungalow.

The legislation that created the California Cultural and Historical Endowment charges the State Library to develop it during in its initial phases. The State Library is already drawing up guidelines for a competitive grant process. Eventually, the endowment probably will stand on its own as a separate and continuing program.

The history and culture of California are important instances of American civilization, indeed of world culture. Now, the endowment will enable us to add many new textures and meanings to the story of California.

Dr. Starr wrote this op-ed piece to announce the beginning of a new entity in state government called the California Cultural and Historical Endowment.