A tree grows in Trona

Just outside the far eastern edge of Kern County in the northern corner of San Bernardino County, almost in Inyo County, is the unincorporated community of Trona. It was established in 1914 as a company town to mine the rich mineral deposits of the dry lakebed. Searles Valley Minerals owns the industrial operations there. There's nothing shiny and new about Trona; when Hollywood needs a visual and atmosphere of isolation and desolation, it looks to Trona. The community is 89 miles from Tehachapi via Hwy. 14 or 96 miles via Hwy. 178. The population is 1,818, according to the 2010 census, down from 2,742 in 2000. Many of the employees live in Ridgecrest, which is the hub of the East Kern communities that include the hyper-scientific population attached to the China Lake Naval Weapons Center and the "living ghost towns" of Johannesburg and Randsburg, whose gold mines have seen their last days. Stark and bleak, with a dirt golf course and high school football field, Trona nevertheless displays a quest for beauty in formidible circumstances. Along the main road and bike path north of town, parallel to the vast expanse of dry white lakebed, every 50 yards or so, a spreading tree fans out over a tiny timbered enclosure behind a blue bench. Who wouldn't welcome a bit of shade on this barren stretch of road? The community that planted those trees and placed those benches confirms the bouancy of the human spirit and offers a welcome respite in a harsh land.