Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Scotty’s Castle… Death Valley Part 2…

Today was pretty warm in Death Valley… our thermometer below tells the storey… after I took this picture, it got up to 103 Deg. F.   WOW!!!!

The middle temp. is inside the RV and the lower number is outside…

 

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So we are a little behind on blogs, since we have had internet problems… the seem to be fixed now… so we will try another blog… on Monday we went up to Scotty’s Castle…  It is in the north end of Death Valley, and belonged to a Man, Mr. Johnson and his Wife from Chicago.  Death Valley Scotty was a bit of a con man, and he was selling land in Death Valley in the late 1920’s… he took a trip to Chicago to find investors and hit on Mr. Johnson…

Johnson was a multi millionaire from the Life Insurance Business…  he decided to go to Death Valley and build a “Summer Home” for him and his wife… and also a spot for Death Valley Scotty to hang out…

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What you see below is 1/2 of the swimming pool!  Johnson had a natural spring, one of the very few in Death Valley, and so built his home here… the spring provide 100 lbs. of water pressure… a normal home has about 40 lbs.

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In the late 1920’s… the U.S. Government sent a surveyor out, and told Mr. Johnson that his land was actually 1 1/2 miles north!  Immediately construction stopped… over 100,000 pool tiles remained in the basement… you have to see it!   It took Johnson 6 years to fight the Gov’t and finally get his land back, but by then the Great Depression set in, and he could not afford to finish the home…

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Electricity was provided by hundreds of these batteries, that were charged by a water wheel that drove a generator…

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This is the water wheel generator that Johnson used… he later changed it to a diesel generator…

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The house was beautiful… the courtyard was amazing…

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This sundial actually worked!  It is set on standard time and we confirmed the time!

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Johnson bought this 1933 Packard and gave it to his Granddaughter for her birthday!

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Everything inside the home is original… including their cloths in the closet!   That is our tour guide who did a great job!

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The rifle collection is original…

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The house if full of these…

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Amazing wood work through out!

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The music room has a great pipe organ that still works… amazing…

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This is only part of the storey of this amazing place… you have to come… and it is only $20.00 each to tour the basement and main floors of the home… (tongue in cheek…)  We had a great time…

This blog has a set limit as I am still working on our generator… so more to come!

Till tomorrow…

3 comments:

  1. That is simply amazing. It's like Hearst Castle in the middle of the desert. Would love to see it but I think I'll wait until the temperatures moderate in the winter!! That's HOT!

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  2. Interesting place. Just gotta love those old eccentrics from yesteryear. They certainly had their hopes & dreams. Kind of reminded me of the Casa Loma guy in Toronto.

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  3. Quite the joint! Must be nice to have those kinds of bucks to just build a castle out in the middle of nowhere! Too bad about the swimming pool though, it sure looked monstrous. A place like that is the last thing I would have expected to see in Death Valley.

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