Mining Southern California

Back in the 1970s, the Union Carbide tungsten mine outside of this small Eastern Sierra city was by far the largest private employer here, with a payroll of more than 500 workers. Perched high in the Sierra on private land within Inyo National Forest, shifts worked around the clock mining and milling the metal. But in the early 1980s, when China began flooding the world market with tungsten and driving down the metal's price, the Bishop mine was forced to cut back.

Most everyone agrees there is something of enormous importance in this rock-strewn and wind-swept portion of the eastern Imperial Valley bounded by Picacho Peak, Pilots Knob and Muggins Peak. A Canadian firm believes there is gold buried deep beneath the desert, and it wants permission to create a 1,571-acre open pit mine where 130,000 tons of rock a day would be gouged, blasted and drilled from the earth.

Mining industry officials thought the president of Viceroy Resource Corp. had lost his mind last year when he committed to $4.4 million in environmental concessions before extracting a speck of gold from the company's Castle Mountain project here. In an unprecedented accord with the environmental community, D. Ross Fitzpatrick agreed to restore the 2,800-acre site after mining it and spend $1.3 million to protect the threatened desert tortoise.

It is the quirky subcultures and out-there personalities of Southern California that have long ignited Robert Ferrigno's writing. Steroid-pumped bodybuilders. Ferrari owners. Auto repo men. Surf bums. Women who compete in bar bikini contests. "I was always interested in subcultures--high or low, it didn't matter," says Ferrigno, 49, who in the 1980s was an Orange County newspaper features writer.

Sen. John Seymour (R-Calif.) says more than 20,000 mining-related jobs would be lost under the desert protection bill pending before Congress. Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) says the measure would not put a single miner out of work. The dispute illustrates the startling gap--and partisan rhetoric--that separates the two sides in the mining debate: Opponents insist the desert legislation would cripple the Southern California mining industry while supporters predict no noticeable economic impact.

Before loading up the mini-van with a gold pan, shovel and sluice box and driving up to California's Mother Lode for a weekend of gold prospecting, remember that the precious yellow metal is as close as the East Fork of the San Gabriel River, above Azusa in the San Gabriel Mountains. "When I tell people there's still gold in California, they look at me kind of strange," said Judy Shaw, owner of California Prospecting Co. in Buena Park.

Most everyone agrees there is something of enormous importance in this rock-strewn and wind-swept portion of the eastern Imperial Valley bounded by Picacho Peak, Pilots Knob and Muggins Peak. A Canadian firm believes there is gold buried deep beneath the desert, and it wants permission to create a 1,571-acre open pit mine where 130,000 tons of rock a day would be gouged, blasted and drilled from the earth.

It is the quirky subcultures and out-there personalities of Southern California that have long ignited Robert Ferrigno's writing. Steroid-pumped bodybuilders. Ferrari owners. Auto repo men. Surf bums. Women who compete in bar bikini contests. "I was always interested in subcultures--high or low, it didn't matter," says Ferrigno, 49, who in the 1980s was an Orange County newspaper features writer.

State officials late Monday approved partial resumption of construction on the massive Metro Rail subway project, where work has been stalled since last week by a stubborn tunnel ventilation problem. Workers will return this morning to a subway station being completed at 7th and Flower streets in downtown Los Angeles, officials said. State safety engineers Monday evening reopened most of the station after transit officials activated a huge, new air circulation system.

Team headquarters for the hottest basketball squad in Southern California is a trailer. Granted, it's a nice trailer. In three hours, you guess, a team of workers could dissemble operations and, like a guy late for the circus, you'd be kicking sawdust. Hey, where did Long Beach State go? How one gets a taste of the action: * From the north, drive past the pyramid of successes in Westwood and get a visual fix on the Pyramid. You can't miss it. It looks like that hotel in Vegas.

Back in the 1970s, the Union Carbide tungsten mine outside of this small Eastern Sierra city was by far the largest private employer here, with a payroll of more than 500 workers. Perched high in the Sierra on private land within Inyo National Forest, shifts worked around the clock mining and milling the metal. But in the early 1980s, when China began flooding the world market with tungsten and driving down the metal's price, the Bishop mine was forced to cut back.

Mining industry officials thought the president of Viceroy Resource Corp. had lost his mind last year when he committed to $4.4 million in environmental concessions before extracting a speck of gold from the company's Castle Mountain project here. In an unprecedented accord with the environmental community, D. Ross Fitzpatrick agreed to restore the 2,800-acre site after mining it and spend $1.3 million to protect the threatened desert tortoise.

Sen. John Seymour (R-Calif.) says more than 20,000 mining-related jobs would be lost under the desert protection bill pending before Congress. Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.) says the measure would not put a single miner out of work. The dispute illustrates the startling gap--and partisan rhetoric--that separates the two sides in the mining debate: Opponents insist the desert legislation would cripple the Southern California mining industry while supporters predict no noticeable economic impact.

Before loading up the mini-van with a gold pan, shovel and sluice box and driving up to California's Mother Lode for a weekend of gold prospecting, remember that the precious yellow metal is as close as the East Fork of the San Gabriel River, above Azusa in the San Gabriel Mountains. "When I tell people there's still gold in California, they look at me kind of strange," said Judy Shaw, owner of California Prospecting Co. in Buena Park.