Rice, California
| Rice, California | |
|---|---|
| — Ghost town — | |
 Rice, California
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| Coordinates: 34°5′1″N 114°50′59″W / 34.08361°N 114.84972°WCoordinates: 34°5′1″N 114°50′59″W / 34.08361°N 114.84972°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | California |
| County | San Bernardino |
| Time zone | Pacific (PST) (UTC-8) |
| • Summer (DST) | PDT (UTC-7) |
| FIPS code | |
| GNIS feature ID | 248157[1] |
Rice, California, formerly named Blythe Junction, is a vacant town site in the southern tip of the Mojave Desert in unincorporated San Bernardino County, California, United States.
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[edit] History
The town, located on present-day State Route 62 approximately midway between Twentynine Palms and the Arizona state line, sprang up around a Santa Fe Railroad subdivision and siding. The subdivision and siding are still in use, but have since changed hands and currently belong to the Arizona and California Railroad, a short line serving southeastern California from Rice to Cadiz, California and southwestern Arizona at Parker. It was the starting point of the abandoned Ripley Branch that goes through Blythe, California to Ripley, California
[edit] Rice Army Airfield/Rice Airport
The Rice Municipal Airport was acquired by the United States Army's 4th Air Support Command in 1942 as a sub-base of Thermal Army Airfield,[2] and was operational by the end of the year. While the airfield's actual date of construction is unknown, it was not depicted on a 1932 Los Angeles Airways Chart, indicating construction sometime in the ten years between 1932 and 1942. Rice Army Airfield consisted of 2 paved 5,000 foot runways and numerous dispersal pads extending beyond the runways to the south. In 1944, the airfield was transferred away from Thermal Army Airfield as a sub-base and assigned to March Field. Operations at Rice Field were ended by August 1944, and the field was declared surplus in late October of that same year.[3] The base was considered the best location to detonate the first atomic bomb; but White Sands Proving Ground was selected for the Trinity (nuclear test) because Manhattan Project manager Leslie Groves did not want to deal with base commanding general George S. Patton.[4][dubious ]
[edit] Rice Shoe Tree
Rice gained some minor notoriety in recent years because of the Rice Shoe Tree, a lone tamarisk on a turnout just south of the highway. For reasons unknown, it became customary for travelers on Highway 62 (also known as Rice Road) to and from the Colorado River to hang an old shoe on the tree's branches. The tree was even featured on California's Gold, a PBS program hosted by Huell Howser. The Rice Shoe Tree burned to the ground in 2003 in a fire of suspicious origin. Though the tree is gone, a 'shoe garden' has replaced it; a fence on which people hang shoes instead. Travelers still stop to spell their names on the nearby Arizona and California Railroad right-of-way with the multi-colored volcanic rock used as ballast. Hand-assembled graffiti lines the railroad for the entire distance that it parallels Highway 62.
Currently (July 2010) at the site of the old service station and shoe fence, there is a movie being filmed. There are rumors going around that they have cleaned up the shoe fence and painted over the "Freedom Warriors" sign on the water tower near the railroad tracks.
[edit] Present day
At some point in the 4 years following the airfield's removal from active Army service, Rice Army Airfield was renamed Rice Airport and began operations as a public civilian airport, housing a small flight school for missionaries. Between the years of 1952 to 1955, Rice Airport was changed to a private field, and later abandoned before 1960 for reasons unknown. As of 2007, no standing structures remain and little evidence exists of the airport's former existence.[3]
There are no standing buildings and no residents in Rice at present. A hand-painted sign on the western outskirts of the town once announced that the townsite was for sale, but that sign has since been removed. The only building which remains in any condition is a demolished service station.
[edit] References
- ^ "Rice, California". Geographic Names Information System, U.S. Geological Survey. http://geonames.usgs.gov/pls/gnispublic/f?p=gnispq:3:::NO::P3_FID:248157.
- ^ http://www.militarymuseum.org/ThermalAAF.html
- ^ a b Abandoned & Little-Known Airfields: California: Southeastern San Bernardino County
- ^ "Trinity Atomic Web Site". Walker, Gregory. http://www.cddc.vt.edu/host/atomic/trinity/trinity1.html. Retrieved 2010-08-20.
[edit] External links
- History of Midland, Calif (nearby ghost town)
