Sign on one of Calico's attractions |
CALICO,
CALIFORNIA—
"Nothing
to frighten children or adults. It is simply amazing, amusing,
and confusing." So reads the sign above one of the
establishments along Calico's main street, inviting all
comers to a tour of a cunningly crooked house. It's the
sort of attraction more commonly associated with amusement
parks,
Calico Ghost Town population statistics |
but
the sign is actually fairly accurate in describing Calico
as a whole. There's nothing frightening about the place,
but if you opt for a visit, there's every chance you may
find the remains of this onetime boomtown "amazing,
amusing, and confusing."
There's
no argument that Calico is a real ghost town. Established
in 1881, Calico produced $86 million in silver and $45 million
in borax during its glory years. At its height, the town
boasted a population of 1,200, 22 saloons, a "Chinatown,"
and a well-known red light district. When the price of silver
plummeted in the 1890's, the town survived on borax revenues
until its official death in 1907.
View of Calico and the Mojave Desert
below |
Calico's
ghosts slumbered on its barren desert hillside until 1951,
when a man named Walter Knott purchased the real estate
upon which it sat. The same entrepreneur who founded Knott's
Berry Farm, Walter Knott set out to make Calico not only
amazing, which it was already, but also amusing, which is
why if you visit today, you can tour a crooked house and
witness a staged gunfight.
Serena Steiner, Calico's historian |
Probably
unintentionally, Walter Knott also made Calico remarkably
confusing. It's hard to tell, fifty-something years later,
what was the work of 19th-century mining engineers and what
was enhancement by an entrepreneurial theme park owner.
Even Calico's historian is sometimes challenged by the juxtaposition
of mining history and subsequent restoration. Primary source
material from the Walter Knott era is patchy, and he did
a very good job of aging his building materials to make
them look like the genuine ghost town article. To put it
simply, it's hard to tell what's old and what was added
in the 1950's. Is Calico a ghost town or an amusement park?
In
spite of Walter Knott's enhancements, Calico is very much
a real ghost town. Thanks to the fact that he donated the
site to San Bernardino County in 1966, Calico is now a regional
park with a professional historian on its staff, and the
full panorama of the town's colorful past is emerging. A
Visitors' Center housed in one of the town's original buildings
has just opened, and it's replete with vintage photographs,
copies of historic newspapers, and other materials dating
to Calico's glory years . Placards explaining the structures
on the site are informative and accurate. It's beginning
to be fairly easy to tell what's "original" and
what is "Knott."
|
"Chinese bathtub"
Outcome of staged gunfight
|
But
the crooked house lives on, and so do the staged gunfights,
the house made of bottles, and a large cauldron labeled
as a Chinese bath tub. You can take a train ride, and you
can look down over an expansive view of the Mojave Desert.
Calico is a delightful patchwork, the product of a checkered
past, all woven together into a sight worth seeing. It's
right off Interstate 15 near Yermo, between Barstow and
Baker. Are you heading for Death Valley or Las Vegas? Stop
by Calico as you head east from Los Angeles, and prepare
to be… amazed, amused, and confused.
Megan
Calico, California
6/01
Click
here to visit Calico online.
