Bishop, California


Bishop is the only incorporated city in Inyo County, California, United States. It is located near the northern end of the Owens Valley in the Mojave Desert, at an elevation of. The city was named after Bishop Creek, flowing out of the Sierra Nevada range; the creek was named after Samuel Addison Bishop, a settler in the Owens Valley. Bishop is a commercial and residential center, while many vacation destinations and tourist attractions in the Sierra Nevada are located nearby. The city covers approximately, making it the county's largest community by population and land area.
The population of the city was 3,819 at the 2020 census, down from 3,879 at the 2010 census. The population of the built-up zone containing Bishop is much larger; more than 14,500 people live in a compact area which includes Bishop, West Bishop, Dixon Lane-Meadow Creek, and the Bishop Paiute Reservation. It is by far the largest settlement in Inyo County.
A number of western films were shot in Bishop, including movies starring John Wayne, Charlton Heston, and Joel McCrea.
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History

The Bishop Creek post office operated from 1870 to 1889 and from 1935 to 1938. The first Bishop post office opened in 1889.
In order to support the growth aspirations of Los Angeles, water was diverted from the Owens River into the Los Angeles Aqueduct in 1913. From the 1910s to 1930s, the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power purchased much of the valley for water rights and control. The result was a substantial change to the Owens Valley culture and environment. The economy of Bishop suffered when farmers, ranchers and land owners sold much of their property. Jack Foley, a Bishop resident and sound effects specialist, mitigated the economic loss by persuading several Los Angeles studio bosses that the town of Bishop would be ideal as a location to shoot westerns.

History and heritage

The city of Bishop was named for one of the first settlers in the area, Samuel A. Bishop. Owens Lake was named for Richard Owens, a member of John C. Fremont's 1845 exploration party which included Kit Carson and Ed Kern. Later the entire valley became known as The Owens Valley. The Paiute Indians called Owens Lake by the name of "Pacheta" and the Owens River "Wakopee." Geographically, Inyo County is today the second largest county in California with a population of slightly over 18,000 residents. The county is so large that several eastern states put together would fit neatly within its boundaries. Inyo County contains both the highest and lowest points in the contiguous United States; Mt. Whitney, 14,496 feet above sea level, and Badwater in Death Valley, 282 feet below sea level. The "Inyo" in Inyo County is commonly believed to be a Indian word meaning "dwelling place of the great spirit."

First American settlers

The first American explorers in the Owens Valley of Eastern California included the famous mountain men Jedediah Smith in 1833 and Joseph Walker in 1834. This remote area of California had never been explored by the Spanish and even though it was shown as Mexican territory on early maps, the Eastern Sierra region remained unvisited by them.
The most renowned early explorer to visit the area was John C. Fremont. He was the first Republican candidate to run for President of the United States in 1856 and later a famous Union Civil War general. Officially sanctioned by the federal government, his 1845 mapping party to the Eastern Sierra included the celebrated Indian scout Kit Carson, for whom the capital of Nevada, Carson City, was named. Also in the party were Ed Kern for whom Kern County, California was named, and Richard Owens, who gave his name to Owens Lake near Lone Pine, California and later Owens Valley itself. Fremont lost a cannon which he had brought along in case of Indian attacks near present-day Bridgeport, California.
The city of Bishop came into being due to the need for beef in a booming mining camp some eighty miles to the north, Aurora, Nevada,. In 1861 cattlemen drove herds of cattle some three hundred miles from the great San Joaquin Valley of California, through the southern Sierra at Walker Pass, up the Owens Valley, and then through Adobe Meadows to Aurora. Along the way, some cattlemen noticed that the unsettled northern Owens Valley was perfect for raising livestock.
To avoid the long journey from the other side of the mountains, a few of them decided to settle in the valley. Driving about 600 head of cattle and 50 horses, Samuel Addison Bishop, his wife, and several hired hands arrived in the Owens Valley on August 22, 1861 from Fort Tejon in the Tehachapi Mountains. Along with Henry Vansickle, Charles Putnam, Allen Van Fleet, and the McGee brothers, Bishop was one of the first white settlers in the valley.
Sheepmen soon followed the cattlement and they initially struggled due to a lack of forage for their stock in the area. Remnants of the early settlers' stone corrals and fences can still be seen north of Bishop along Highway 395 in Round Valley, California. Establishing a homestead, the San Francis Ranch, along the creek which still bears his name, Samuel Bishop set up a market to sell beef to the miners and business owners in Aurora. One of the residents of Aurora at that time was a young Samuel Clemens who later gained fame as author Mark Twain. By 1862, a frontier settlement, known as Bishop Creek, was established a couple of miles east of the San Francis Ranch. Though the town continues to prosper, the only reminder of Samuel Bishop's ranch today is a monument placed near the original site at the corner of Highway 168 West and Red Hill Road, two miles west of downtown Bishop.
In 1866, the County of Inyo was established from part of Tulare County. The Eastern High Sierra and the Owens Valley was the westernmost frontier in America at that time. In 1871, Daniel Bruhn was one of 41 wranglers herding nearly 3,000 wild Spanish mustangs from Stockton, California to Texas. Their travels brought them over the High Sierra and into the remote Owens Valley, where they lost over 500 head of horses. The descendants of those mustangs still roam wild on the California/Nevada border just north of Bishop.

Water conflicts of the Owens Valley

As Los Angeles expanded during the late 19th century, it began outgrowing its water supply. Fred Eaton, mayor of Los Angeles, promoted a plan to take water from Owens Valley, where Bishop lies, to Los Angeles via an aqueduct. Between 1905 and 1907, most of the land in the Owens Valley was purchased from farmers and ranchers at bargain prices by Eaton, ostensibly for a his own use. The real goal was to send Owens Valley water south to Los Angeles. In 1907, Eaton traveled to Washington to meet with advisers of Theodore Roosevelt to convince them that the water of the Owens River would do more good flowing through faucets in Los Angeles than it would if used on Owens Valley fields and orchards. Despite a political fight with Congressman Sylvester Smith, who represented the area around Bishop, Roosevelt decided in favor of the aqueduct.
The aqueduct was built from 1907 to 1913 under the supervision of William Mullholland. The aqueduct is long, used no pumping stations; only gravity siphons. By 1928, Los Angeles owned 90 percent of the land and subsequent water rights in Owens Valley effectively rendering all agriculture, economic and development interests in the region effectively dead. With the diversion of water to Los Angeles, the Owens Lake and lower Owens River dried up, forcing many valley residents to leave the area. For a number of years, Owens Valley residents expressed much animosity toward the city of Los Angeles; for example, in Dry Ditches, a book of poems published in 1934 by the Parcher family of Bishop. The Owens Valley–city of Los Angeles conflict was the inspiration of the 1974 film Chinatown, starring Jack Nicholson.

Indian cultural heritage

Indians live in and near Bishop on four reservations. The southernmost is the Lone Pine Indian Reservation; northward is Fort Independence Reservation and Big Pine Indian Reservation. The largest and northernmost is the Bishop Indian Reservation.

Geography

Bishop lies west of the Owens River at the northern end of the Owens Valley. The city is located on U.S. Route 395, the main north–south artery through the Owens Valley, connecting the Inland Empire to Reno, Nevada. US 395 also connects Bishop to Los Angeles via State Route 14 through Palmdale. Bishop is the western terminus of U.S. Route 6. The Paiute-Shoshone Indians of the Bishop Community of the Bishop Colony control land just west of the town. The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power controls much of the upstream and surrounding area.
Bishop is immediately to the east of the Sierra Nevada, and west of the White Mountains. Numerous peaks are within a short distance of Bishop, including Mount Humphreys to the west, White Mountain Peak to the northeast, and pyramidal Mount Tom northwest of town. Basin Mountain is viewed to the west from Bishop as it rises above the Buttermilks. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of, over 97% of it land. Bishop is known as the "Mule Capital of the World" and a week-long festival called Bishop Mule Days has been held since 1969 during the week of Memorial Day, celebrating the contributions of pack mules to the area. The festival attracts many tourists, primarily from the Southern California area.
Bishop is well known in the rock climbing community. Near the city are numerous climbing spots that attract visitors from around the world. There are over 2,000 bouldering locations in Bishop. The two main types of rock are volcanic tuff and granite.

Notable locations

Climate

Bishop, as well as the rest of the Owens Valley, has an arid climate with an annual average of 4.84" of precipitation, and is part of USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 7b. The wettest year was 1969 with 17.09" of precipitation and the driest 2013 with 1.33 inches. Measurable precipitation occurs on an average of 26 days annually. The most precipitation in one month was 8.93" in January 1969, which included 4" on January 4, the most rainfall recorded in 24 hours in Bishop. Snowfall averages 6.8" per season. The snowiest season was from July 1968 to June 1969 with 57.1", which included the snowiest month, January 1969, at 23.2 inches.
There is an average of 3 nights lows below ten degrees, 139 nights where the low reaches the freezing mark, 104 days with 90+ degree highs, and 29 days with 100+ degree highs. Due to the aridity and hot high-altitude sun, there are only 34 days with maxima below 50 degrees, and only one per year with a maximum below freezing, and the annual diurnal temperature variation is 36.9 degrees, reaching 42 degrees in summer. The record high temperature of 111 degrees occurred on July 10, 2021; the record low of -8° was recorded on December 22, 1990, and December 27, 1988. Diurnals are wide enough that temperatures both during summer and winter afternoons resemble Southern Spain's interior, whereas nights in both seasons are similar to those found on the Baltic Sea in far northern Europe.
Cold daytime highs and warm nights are rare, but have happened on occasion. The coldest daytime maximum measured was 19° in 1962. Ice days are infrequent with the warmer climate of recent decades. Between 1991 and 2020 the coldest maximum temperature of the year averaged 35° with the coldest days barely remaining below freezing. The warmest night on record was 75° in 1961 while the average warmest night stands at 68°.

Demographics

The demographic information here applies to residents living within the city limits of Bishop; 3,879 people are in downtown Bishop.
The "greater Bishop area," which includes unincorporated nearby neighborhoods such as West Bishop, Meadow Creek-Dixon Lane, Wilkerson Ranch, Rocking K, Mustang Mesa, Round Valley and the Bishop Paiute Tribe add an additional 11,000 residents to the greater Bishop area.

2020

The 2020 United States census reported that Bishop had a population of 3,819. The population density was. The racial makeup of Bishop was 63.5% White, 0.2% African American, 2.8% Native American, 2.4% Asian, 0.1% Pacific Islander, 17.4% from other races, and 13.6% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 30.0% of the population.
The census reported that 96.7% of the population lived in households, 1.6% lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 1.7% were institutionalized.
There were 1,748 households, out of which 28.5% included children under the age of 18, 31.5% were married-couple households, 8.9% were cohabiting couple households, 30.7% had a female householder with no partner present, and 28.9% had a male householder with no partner present. 39.7% of households were one person, and 17.9% were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.11. There were 904 families.
The age distribution was 19.7% under the age of 18, 6.7% aged 18 to 24, 27.7% aged 25 to 44, 26.4% aged 45 to 64, and 19.5% who were 65years of age or older. The median age was 41.0years. For every 100 females, there were 97.7 males.
There were 1,939 housing units at an average density of, of which 1,748 were occupied. Of these, 36.7% were owner-occupied, and 63.3% were occupied by renters.
In 2023, the US Census Bureau estimated that the median household income was $82,205, and the per capita income was $54,267. About 2.9% of families and 6.0% of the population were below the poverty line.

Politics and government

In the state legislature Bishop is in. It is also in the 4th State Senate district. Federally, Bishop is in.
Bishop maintains its own police force, but also has a substation of the Inyo County Sheriff's Department on the outskirts of the city. The California Highway Patrol also has an office in town.

Transportation

Highways

U.S. Route 395 is the four-lane divided highway serving Bishop between southern California and Reno while U.S. Route 6 provides access to Tonopah and other communities in Nevada. The junction of U.S. Routes 395 and 6 is one of only two junctions of two U.S. Routes in California, the other being the junction of U.S. Routes
101 and 199 in Crescent City, California. Section Two of State Route 168 overlaps with U.S. Route 395 here until the road reaches Big Pine.

Airports

The Eastern Sierra Regional Airport provides general aviation services in addition to seasonal scheduled passenger airline service nonstop to Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Denver operated by SkyWest Airlines flying as United Express with regional jet aircraft on behalf of United Airlines.

Public Transportation Services

Eastern Sierra Transit offers bus service as far north as Reno, Nevada, and as far south as Lancaster, California.

In popular culture

A number of westerns and other films were shot in Bishop:

Notable residents

Media

AM radio

FM radio

Newspapers

Inyo RegisterThe SheetThe Sierra Reader
  • ''El Sol De La Sierra''

Television

Online

  • ''Eastern Sierra Now''