Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
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Nuwä basketweavers were some of the finest basketmakers in California, a state that historically has been home to many of the country's best basketmaking traditions. One of them was a lady named Rosie Hicks. Rosie was born about 1890 and was the daughter of Luisa (Louise) Marcus, who was the grandmother of noted Nuwä (Kawaiisu or Southern Paiute) elder Andy Greene, who is depicted on the Nuwä mural on the side of the Hitching Post Theaters on Green Street in Downtown Tehachapi. Andy has passed a...
Joel Esparza Sanchez, 61, was peacefully called home by the Lord on Monday, Sept. 26 at his residence in Tehachapi. Born in Bakersfield on Dec. 21, 1960, he was lovingly raised alongside his sister, Anita, by parents Luis and Ramona Sanchez. Joel graduated from Tehachapi High School in 1978, and in the early 80s began working at Monolith (later Calaveras and Lehigh Southwest) Cement Company where his father was also employed. He began his career as a laborer and ultimately became a First-Class...
"Time, industry, hard work, patience and a large number of donkeys and mules will overcome all difficulties." – Padre Johann Jakob Baegert Father Baegert was a German Jesuit priest stationed in Baja California in the mid 1700s. Large numbers of mules were used to move the huge sections of pipe needed to build the Los Angeles Aqueduct beginning in 1904. The cement plant at Monolith (now called Lehigh Southwest) was built by the Los Angeles Dept. of Water and Power to supply cement for the a...
I left you in the early days of the 20th Century in "nineteen 'aught' nine." That's the way the old timers said those early years. They called zeroes "aughts" in those days. We missed our chance. We could have been saying twenty " aught" one all through nine! Oh, well. 1909 – The City of Los Angeles Cement Company was established four miles east of Tehachapi. An aqueduct was needed to provide Los Angeles and parts of the southland with water from the Owens Valley. They closed the plant down a...
In a memo to parents attempting to distance themselves from a recent "Let Them Play" rally, the Tehachapi Unified School District made what appeared to be an innocent typo, claiming the gathering at "Cory(sic) Burnett Field" was not sanctioned by the District in the officially released document. Of course, most of us know the home field of the Tehachapi Warriors is "Coy Burnett Field," minus the extra "r" inserted by the president of the school board who in haste autographed the memo without...
One day after I got off work at Lehigh Southwest, I took a drive to think about my Dad, who passed away the year before. I took a dirt road not far from the entrance to Sand Canyon, and I came up on some commercial bee hives. There in broad daylight, at 3:35 in the afternoon, was a black bear lounging against some hives. He had torn two of them open. He was sitting on his rump, leaning against some hives with his arm resting on them, scooping honeycomb into his mouth, swipe after swipe. He...
My brother, just four years older than I, considered himself an "information, please" person from which I could gain facts and bits of history. One day when I was about nine, I asked him what made the scar on the timbered Tehachapi Mountain Range south of town. He told me it was an old lime kiln which once was used to take lime ore to the cement plant east of town. That was good enough for me, I just wanted to know why the scar was on the mountain. Some years later, my eldest brother, nine...
Everyone is familiar with the Lehigh Southwest Cement plant located off Hwy 58 between Love's Travel Stop and Sand Canyon. Many don't realize that the plant has been in operation for over 100 years. It was originally built by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to supply the cement for the construction of the L.A. Aqueduct which brought water from the Owens River to Los Angeles. The little town of Monolith grew up around the plant and at one time housed around 350 residents and a town...
When South Street Digital owner Lydia Chaney walked into Tehachapi City Hall with two cardboard boxes on March 15, the city's Economic Development Coordinator Michelle Vance whooped and ran to open one of the boxes. She triumphantly held up a newly printed colorful tri-fold brochure. "It's the trail map! The mountain bike trails! The Tehachapi Mountain Trail Association (TMTA) brochure is a guide map of winding, sometimes angular loops of pathway that mountain bikers and other volunteers...
The weather web site mountainbase.com, based at Oak Knolls in Golden Hills, reports that the total rainfall for the first two months of 2017 at that site measured 9.52 inches. The rainfall came during two major storms, one on Jan. 5 and another on Feb., 17. The heavy storms damaged the dirt roads of eastern Sand Canyon, leaving them eroded, severely creviced and impassable. As they have done before, the residents worked together to fix the roads, which now are in good shape. They attacked the...
The 2017 Tehachapi GranFondo has opened rider registration for the Sep. 16 event on its website http://TehachapiGranFondo.com The City of Tehachapi is excited to announce several top sponsors are already on board for the signature cycling event that rides through the beautiful Tehachapi communities and starts in Historic Downtown Tehachapi. Kaiser Permanente, BHE Renewables, the Lehigh Southwest Cement Company and Sangera Subaru have signed on as key sponsors for the 2017 Tehachapi GranFondo....
With a vote of 3-2, the City Council defeated a proposal by newly elected City Councilman Kenneth Hetge requesting that the City draft an ordinance limiting the number of years a citizen can serve on the City Council. His proposal included a lifetime limit of three terms or 12 years of total service, stating that this would mirror the 2012 California state proposition supporting term limits. Mayor Grimes added that the 2012 proposition exempted any official sitting at the time of the vote....
Fires – Above, a helicopter vacuums up water at Middle Lake in Bear Valley Springs through a snorkel, filling its tank in 45 seconds. Helicopters fitted with buckets scooped up loads in 10 seconds. The helicopters, staged as closely as a minute apart, dropped the water on the Deer Fire, which advanced up the hill from Hwy. 223. Air tankers dropped fire bright red retardant. The blaze started July 1, 2016, covered 1,785 acres and was 93 percent contained by July 6. It threatened homes in BVS and...
At first glance, it could be a palace in the mist, arising mysteriously from the pages of history. At night, hundreds of lights create an image of a sparkling Manhattan Island or of a cruise ship beckoning across the water. The landmark Lehigh Southwest Cement plant has been producing construction materials for homes, roads and infrastructure in California since 1908. With the supervision of engineer William Mulholland, the Los Angeles Board of Public Works built the plant to supply cement for...
Advance team, engineers share progress at community meetings California High Speed Rail (HSR) Authority has jettisoned a proposed track alignment across the Lehigh Southwest Cement 40-year expansion quarry and Oak Creek-area wind farms in favor of a more westerly route through Cal Portland Cement quarry property. HSR engineers have been meeting with Cal Portland executives to work out the better of two proposed routes through their quarry. Much of the HSR track through the property would be...
I left you in the early days of the Twentieth Century in “nineteen ‘aught’ nine.” That’s the way the old timers said those early years. They called zeroes “aughts” in those days. Sometimes “naughts” too. 1909 - The City of Los Angeles Cement Company was established four miles east of Tehachapi. An aqueduct was needed to provide Los Angeles with water from the Owens Valley. They closed the plant down after the project was finished. For a time it produced Potash; not to make cement again unti...
An informational meeting Nov. 20 on the Lehigh Southwest Cement Plant application to use alternative fuels in the cement-making process – including treated trash, biomass and old tires – drew tough questions from residents worried about air quality. "If this great experiment goes awry," said a person in the audience of 30 at the Kern County Veterans Memorial Building, "is there insurance to compensate people?" Another person said, "I am being treated for COPD, asthma and chronic bronchitis. Whe...
The Stallion Springs CSD Board of Directors held its monthly meeting on Tuesday, May 27 with Directors Burt, Lamkin, Young and Gunshinan present with Director Mueller joining by phone. The board approved a Resolution authorizing the General Manager to prepare a report of the properties with Delinquent and Inactive charges. A Resolution was also approved to have the tax assessment to fund the cost of the District's Police/Administration Building. General Manager Mary Beth Garrison noted that...
Tehachapi, CA – One-hundred miles north of Los Angeles, rumors of lift-serviced mountain biking are swirling in the tiny town of Tehachapi, Calif. Nestled along Highway 58 between Mojave and Bakersfield, the 14,000-person town is already well-known among Southern California skaters and BMXers as being home to the Woodward West action-sports park, but downhillers may soon want to drop a pin here as well. Gravity Logic and Tehachapi Locals Gather to Discuss Bike Park Possibility The Gravity Logic...
Engineers designing the California High-Speed Rail (HSR) must move mountains – and people, houses, roads, orchards and maybe a corral or two. Farmers and residents at ground zero in the first segment of the first HSR track to be under construction – a 29-mile stretch from Madera to Fresno – are faced with the reality that they are expected to get out of the way. In spite of funding difficulties and vociferous opposition to the project, it appears the train has left the depot. The next const...
The wines chosen for the Main Street Feb. 15 Valentine's Wine and Chocolate tasting may be familiar to many of those attending but there are some lesser known vineyards represented, along with local wine makers. The familiar taste of cabs, chardonnays, sparkling wines, and other varietals come from domestic as well as foreign wine producers and have been chosen with an eye to affordable selections. The selection of wines also includes some you may not have tasted, but whose names you may recogni...
