Mojave Water

In light of the fact that California is facing yet another drought season, I decided to write about an article my mother Marion Deaver wrote on the history of water in Mojave and the formation of the Mojave Public Utilities District.

Mojave was called the “Land of Little Rain” by Author Mary Austin. Water was, and is, the topic of concern in Mojave and other East Kern communities who strive to provide enough water for present and future development in the region.

As you [may] have read in this and other columns, Mojave was created by the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1876. The railroad company chose the site at the foot of the nearby Tehachapi Mountains where they could maintain a fleet of steam helper engines to help their trains up the Tehachapi grade to the Summit.

It was also a good junction site for routes to Owens Valley, Death Valley, and Barstow and Needles. But they discovered it was not a good site for water.

The railroad company drilled several wells with little or no water, so they had to look elsewhere. They found water 12 miles to the northwest of them, (on the way to Tehachapi), where the railway right-of-way passed through an area with fields of thick hay and flowing artesian wells. Water seemed to be everywhere.

They drilled a well there and laid an eight-inch pipe from the pump to the storage tanks in Mojave. The eight inch pipe was made from redwood, wrapped with thick wire.

I know this because my parents, on one of their jaunts in the desert, spotted some of the wire poking up from the ground near the tracks just north of Mojave. They dug it up and cut about a four foot section from the abandoned line and donated it to the East Kern Historical Society where it was later displayed.

I was with them on this little trip because I could still see Mojave from where they were. Sometimes when they were going exploring way out in the desert they left me with a sitter. I was sure we would be lost forever and that no one would ever find us. (I was a little wimp.)

The railroad used this line for 40 years until the Monroe Family, farmers in the Cache Creek area filed a complaint with the railroad saying they were taking all the water and that the artesian wells were drying up and the wild hay was gone.

The complaint was settled when the railroad bought all the water rights in that section in 1921. The railroad bought the water and sold it to residents in Mojave. That lasted until 1935 when the gold boom hit.

The railroad was having trouble supplying water to the town and decided to get out of the water business. The company sold the water distribution system to the newly formed Mojave Public Utilities District in 1938.

The railroad agreed to continue to sell water to the district until they could afford to furnish their own water.

The war years the demand for water for steam engines was such that the railroad company drilled another well in the Monroe pastures, built another redwood pipe and sent the water to Mojave.

Mojave continued to use that water until 1950, when Monolith Portland Cement Company filed a complaint in court saying Mojave had no right to the water. Monolith won and Mojave had to find its own water.

The utility district drilled a well in Cache Creek area and later the railroad purchased the water system, fighting Monolith all the way.

Mojave then purchased land north of Mojave in the Chaffee Basin and had two good producing wells in that area. The district later contracted with AVEK to purchase some of its water as well.

My mother insisted that the AVEK water tasted bad and bought bottled water from that day forward.

The utility district thrives today and supplies water to the town of Mojave – and I think the water tastes just fine....