Published in November, 2007, The Silence and the Sun is a thorough, detailed historical account of towns and settlements in the Eastern Mojave Desert of California on or near old Route 66 – towns such as Amboy, Saltus, Bagdad, Chambless, Cadiz Summit and Danby, and railroad communities with whimsical names such as Siberia, Klondike, Trojan, Siam and Cadiz. The gold and silver mines in the Old Woman Mountains and Ship Mountains eventually played out and were abandoned in the 1930s, and towns and businesses along Route 66 that depended on automobile traffic quickly and quietly died when Interstate-40 opened in 1973 and Route 66 was bypassed. Today the mines are quiet and with only a few exceptions the homes and businesses that once comprised the Route 66 communities are also gone.
Here too are the full stories of the relatively unknown and long-abandoned desert communities of Chubbuck, Milligan (Miligan), and Archer told with verve and insight by the author who knows them well. The Silence and the Sun is a compilation of the personal accounts of dozens of people I interviewed who were raised in these desert settlements and is liberally annotated with historic and modern photographs. The opening chapter is a detailed account of the 1976 discovery and ensuing controversy surrounding the Old Woman Meteorite, the second largest meteorite ever found in the United States.
The book also includes a chapter written by Roger Hatheway, a Route 66 authority who traces plethora of names that were applied at one time or another to this historic section of Route 66 including National Old Trails Road, Ocean-to-Ocean Highway, the Mother Road and Dandy Desert Highway. The book contains maps showing the location of the towns and driving directions for the places off of pavement, and detailed site maps of Amboy and Chubbuck designed to aid those who wish to walk the old towns on foot.
Table of Contents:
- The Old Woman Meteorite.
- Cadiz Summit.
- Cadiz and Chambless Junction.
- Bagdad and points west – Trojan, Siberia, Klondike, Ash Hill.
- Danby, Old Danby and Siam.
- Skeleton Pass Road and Rice-1.
- Archer.
- Chubbuck.
- Milligan (Miligan).
- Amboy.
- What’s in a Name. Typonymy of Route 66 by Roger Hatheway.
- Tom Schofield, Prospector
- Appendix I. Bagdad Residents 1890 – 1934.
- Appendix II. Amboy Residents 1890 – 1964.
- Appendix III Student Attendance at the Chubbuck School, 1932 – 1950.