It was an Inyo County maintained road, never an NPS road. The road and Panamint City were outside the old monument boundaries. After the big washouts of 1984 flushed out all the road base fill out of the narrows, the county basically gave up on the road even though it was still on the books. I’ve seen documentation in the county courthouse in my researching in the past decades of the county’s ownership of the road, but now have forgotten details.
Before the Center for BioDiversity won their lawsuit, there were still a number of tax paying landowners at Panamint, including those with patented claims. Several times that I was in the canyon after I moved to Trona in 1987 until the CBD lawsuit I would find trucks parked as far as they could get up the canyon, parked there by owners who ferried equipment and supplies to their claims to keep their patents active. The route after 1984 was also a magnet for extreme off roading. There is a video by Rick Russell that features one of his guided tours up there.
I have a photo of a 1956 Buick Roadmaster parked near the Hilton with the smelter stack in the background and a woman standing by the car. In Trona, my wife and I were friends with a now long deceased woman who also had a 1950s Buick Roadmaster and who used to take a cake to Shotgun Mary at Panamint every Christmas in the 1950s and 1960s.
Before the Center for BioDiversity won their lawsuit, there were still a number of tax paying landowners at Panamint, including those with patented claims. Several times that I was in the canyon after I moved to Trona in 1987 until the CBD lawsuit I would find trucks parked as far as they could get up the canyon, parked there by owners who ferried equipment and supplies to their claims to keep their patents active. The route after 1984 was also a magnet for extreme off roading. There is a video by Rick Russell that features one of his guided tours up there.
I have a photo of a 1956 Buick Roadmaster parked near the Hilton with the smelter stack in the background and a woman standing by the car. In Trona, my wife and I were friends with a now long deceased woman who also had a 1950s Buick Roadmaster and who used to take a cake to Shotgun Mary at Panamint every Christmas in the 1950s and 1960s.
DAW
~When You Live in Nevada, "just down the road" is anywhere in the line of sight within the curvature of the earth.
~When You Live in Nevada, "just down the road" is anywhere in the line of sight within the curvature of the earth.