Descriptive Summary
Access
Publication Rights
Preferred Citation
Acquisition Information
Accruals
Park History
Scope and Content of Collection
Indexing Terms
Related Material at California State Parks
Additional Information
Descriptive Summary
Title: Providence Mountains State Recreation Area Photographic Collection
Dates: 1936-2016
Bulk Dates: 1940-1945, 1955-1980, 1991-1992, 2009, 2016
Collection number: Consult repository
Creator:
California State Parks
Collector:
California State Parks
Collection Size:
755 images
Repository:
Photographic Archives.
California State Parks
Abstract: The Providence Mountains State Recreation Area Photographic Collection contains 755 images that date from 1936 through 2016.
Images depict the property as a tourist attraction run by Jack and Ida Mitchell and later as a state park.
Physical location: For current information on the physical location of these materials, please consult the Guide to the California State Parks
Photographic Archives, available online.
Languages:
Languages represented in the collection:
English
Access
Collection is open for research by appointment.
Publication Rights
Property rights reside with the repository. Copyrights are retained by the creators of the records. For permission to reproduce
or to publish, please contact the Head Curator of the California State Parks Photographic Archives.
Preferred Citation
[Identification of item including photographer and date when available], Providence Mountains State Recreation Area Photographic
Collection, [Catalog number], California State Parks Photographic Archives, McClellan, California
Acquisition Information
Images donated by Jack and Ida Mitchell, generated by California State Parks staff, and transferred from Providence Mountains
State Recreation Area at various dates.
Accruals
Further accruals are expected.
Park History
Providence Mountains State Recreation Area contains roughly 5,890 acres of natural, cultural, and historical resources. Located
in east San Bernardino County, the park is nestled within the borders of the Mojave National Preserve, contains the Providence
Mountains, and is approximately 56 miles west of the city of Needles. The park is accessible by car via Essex Road.
The Mohave tribe resided in the area containing the present-day park for thousands of years prior to its displacement by the
Chemehuevi tribe, a branch of the Southern Paiute, roughly 500 years ago. Originally hailing from the present-day state of
Arizona, the Chemehuevi were nomadic hunter-gatherers who quickly acclimated to their new desert surroundings. They grew adept
at hunting game and finding water, nuts, and edible plants in the often inhospitable Mojave Desert. The historic centerpiece
of the modern-day park, the caverns provided shelter, food-storage space, and ceremonial settings for the relative newcomers.
Themselves displaced by Euro Americans in the 1860s, today the Chemehuevi live and work in the cities of Twentynine Palms,
Banning, and Indio.
The Spanish first encountered the area en route to the San Gabriel Mission in 1776. The next white travelers were Euro Americans
led by famed trapper Jedediah Smith, who arrived 50 years later; many more came in the years following California statehood.
In charge of the Arkansas-to-Los Angeles leg of the Pacific Railroad Survey in the mid-1850s, Lieutenant Amiel Weeks Whipple
was soon followed into the Mojave Desert by Edward F. Beale, who established Beale Wagon Road along the 35th Parallel by 1860.
By 1865, the Mojave Indian Trail, used for centuries by indigenous travelers, had been commandeered by the U.S. military,
renamed “Mojave Road,” and was outfitted with camps of soldiers providing protection for postal carriers and other American
travelers.
Beginning in the 1860s, prospectors began to flood into the area in search of minerals—silver, lead, gold, and copper—embedded
in the Providence Mountain range, so called by the Americans for its proximity to abundant water supplies. Local miners prospered
most greatly between 1870 and 1893, a period when the federal government purchased silver ore at high prices. In 1883, the
Southern Pacific Railroad established a route through the eastern Mojave Desert, granting local mining interests access to
national markets. However, after the turn of the twentieth century, when the U.S. stopped purchasing silver in bulk quantities,
the industry quickly declined. By 1907, a year of economic recession, major mining investments ceased entirely.
In the 1920s and early 1930s, individuals occasionally attempted prospecting in the abandoned mines. One such would-be silver
miner, Jesse E. “Jack” Mitchell, was so impressed by his 1929 visit to the Providence Mountains (specifically “Crystal” or
“Providence” caverns) that he returned and struck a claim the following year. But Jack Mitchell and his wife Ida, whose Los
Angeles-based real estate business went bankrupt during the Great Depression, soon grew more interested in the terrain’s potential
for tourism than for mining. In order to maintain his claim’s validity according to mining law, Mitchell demonstrated ongoing
progress by building tunnels, shipping ore, and filing patents on the claims. Meanwhile, the Mitchells built four buildings—still
standing in the present-day park—out of native local stones to accommodate visitors’ lodging needs, installed pipes for transporting
water, and led guided tours through “Mitchell's Caverns."
In the 1940s, Ida Mitchell petitioned the California Division of Beaches and Parks to incorporate Mitchell Caverns into the
state park system. After Jack Mitchell died in 1954, the State purchased the 628-acre property, which included the buildings
as well as the caverns, and classified it a state park. The following year, it was reclassified a state reserve and incorporated
into the Providence Mountains State Recreation Area as the internal unit, Mitchell Caverns Natural Preserve, in 1972.
Prior to the park’s indefinite closure in 2011, California State Parks, having coordinated with the Mojave Desert Interpretive
Association, maintained numerous natural, cultural, and historic resources at Providence Mountains State Recreation Area.
In addition to El Pakiva and Tecopa caves (the only limestone caverns in the state park system) and the Mitchell’s original
buildings, the park also includes numerous ruins from the historic mining era, Chemehuevi archaeological remains, and vast
expanses of scenic desert full of drought-resistant vegetation and rare animal species, including Niptus beetles that are
only found in the caverns. Since its closure, the park has fallen victim to vandalism and theft. As of September 2016, it
remains closed, but is slated to reopen at an as-yet-unspecified date.
Scope and Content of Collection
The Providence Mountains State Recreation Area Photographic Collection spans the years 1936-2016, with the bulk of the collection
covering the years 1940-1945, 1955-1980, 1991-1992, 2009, and 2016. There is a total of 755 cataloged images including 253
photographic prints, scans, and negatives, 295 35mm slides, and 207 born-digital images. Photographs originated primarily
from California State Parks staff and Jack and Ida Mitchell’s donated collection.
The collection mainly depicts Mitchell Caverns. Interior views of Tecopa and El Pakiva caves feature various geological formations,
including limestone stalactites, stalagmites, flowstone, popcorn, drapes, cave coral, cave shields, curtains, columns, calcite
crystals, soda straw formations, cave ribbons, and cave spaghetti. Interior images also feature stairways, walkways with hand
railings, and lighting fixtures as well as park rangers conducting tours for visitors. Exterior views depict the caverns’
entrances and exits.
The collection also documents the park’s many non-cavernous features in numerous desert views. Features include Providence
Mountains, park campgrounds, the desert landscape, and a bounty of desert vegetation such as various species of cacti and
flowers, creosote bushes, yucca, and Joshua trees. Also documented are Chemehuevi cultural artifacts, bighorn petroglyphs,
and a birthing rock, all located near Wild Horse Mesa.
The collection also includes depictions of several buildings, structures, and objects, both historic and introduced by California
State Parks. Subjects include the Mitchells’ stone-constructed residence converted into park headquarters as well as other
stone buildings built by Jack Mitchell; the Mary Beale Memorial Plaque, commemorating the life of the Mojave Desert-based
naturalist as well as the nature trail that also honors her memory; the remnants of a nineteenth-century wagon; road, highway,
and park signage; and the ruins of the area’s most prosperous historic silver mine, Bonanza King Mine, as well as the ruins
of the mining community that emerged alongside it, the former town of Providence.
The collection additionally documents construction projects at the park. Projects include the 1960 construction of a concrete-block
reservoir water tank and the Deferred Maintenance Program, conducted circa 1998 to 1999.
Also included are images donated by the Mitchells. This collection includes portraits and candid shots of Jack and Ida Mitchell,
promotional postcards of the park manufactured during their tenure, and documentation of the buildings that they constructed.
Indexing Terms
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in
the library's online public access catalog.
Archaeology--California.
California. Department of Parks and Recreation
Chemehuevi Indians.
Cultural resources
Mitchell, Ida, 1880-1966
Mitchell, Jack, 1882-1954
Mitchell Caverns (Calif.)
Mohave Indians.
Mojave Desert (Calif.)
Mojave National Preserve (Calif.)
Natural resources
Petroglyphs--California--Mojave Desert.
Providence Mountains Wilderness (Calif.)
San Bernardino County (Calif.)
Related Material at California State Parks
Providence Mountains State Recreation Area Collection
Additional Information