Coso Hot Springs

Last updated
Coso Hot Springs
USA California location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Usa edcp location map.svg
Red pog.svg
Nearest city Little Lake, Inyo County, California
Area510 acres (210 ha)
Built1900
Architectural styleRustic architecture
NRHP reference No. 78000674 [1]
Added to NRHPJanuary 3, 1978

Coso Hot Springs is a hot spring complex in the Coso Volcanic Field in the Mojave Desert of Inyo County, California. [2] The Springs are on the National Register of Historic Places.

Contents

Geography

The Coso Hot Springs lie within the boundaries of the Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake (NAWS China Lake), near Little Lake, Inyo County, California and U.S. Route 395. They are near the Coso Mountains, north of Indian Wells Valley and south of the Owens Valley. The hot springs are part of the geothermal activity of the Coso Volcanic Field.

Water profile

The hot mineral water emerges from the ground at 207 °F (97 °C). [3]

History

The springs were a traditional Native American cultural and healing ritual site of the Coso people, and later the Northern Paiute and Timbisha. The site is called Kooso or Muattang Ka in Timbisha. [4] In the 1920s it was a "hot springs resort." Contemporary local Native American people periodically have ceremonies at the springs.

Coso Hot Springs is the site of one of the largest (if not the largest) assemblages of prehistoric rock art in North America. [5] The areas known as Big and Little Petroglyph Canyons by the hot springs have over 20,000 remarkably undisturbed images in a distinctive so-called Coso style.

Coso Hot Springs, February 4, 1920 Coso-hot-springs.jpg
Coso Hot Springs, February 4, 1920

See also

Remains of a wooden sweat lodge used by the Paiute and Timbisha people for healing rituals. Coso hot springs.jpg
Remains of a wooden sweat lodge used by the Paiute and Timbisha people for healing rituals.

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Archeological Site CA-INY-134, in Inyo County, California near Olancha, California, is an archeological site that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). The site is located in the Coso Range 6 miles (9.7 km) northwest of Coso Hot Springs. It has also been known as Ayer's Rock Pictograph Site, as Bob Rabbit's Pictographs, as INY-134 and as INY-105. Prehistorically, it served as a camp and as a ceremonial site. The site includes three pictograph panels carved into a monolith. The pictographs are painted in a variety of colors and depict animal and human figures.

References

  1. "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service. March 13, 2009.
  2. Person, M. A.; Cohen, D.; Sabin, A.; Unruh, J.; Gable, C.; Zyvoloski, G.; Meade, D.; Bjornstad, S.; Monastero, F. (2007). "Coso Hot Springs: A Condensate Fed Geothermal Feature". AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts. American Geophysical Union, Fall Meeting 2007. 2007. Bibcode:2007AGUFM.V54C..02P.
  3. Berry, George; Grim, Paul; Ikelman, Joy (1980). Thermal Springs List for the United States. Boulder, Colorado: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
  4. Dayley, Jon (1989). Tumpisa (Panamint) Shoshone dictionary. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. ISBN   978-0520097544.
  5. Gilreath, Amy; Hildebrandt, William (2008). "Coso rock art within its archaeological context". Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology. 28 (1): 1–22. JSTOR   27825873 . Retrieved 10 April 2021.

Coordinates: 36°02′46″N117°46′13″W / 36.04611°N 117.77028°W / 36.04611; -117.77028