Site of Bend City

Bend City was busy enough in the mid-1860s to be named seat of Coso County, a county that was never actually formed, and it built the first county bridge across the Owens River. Then the river left. The 1872 earthquake shifted the channel, and the town found itself beside a dry ravine rather than a waterway. The mines faded, the bridge had nothing to cross, and what remains east of Independence is a scatter of stone in the sagebrush.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Manzanar National Historic Site — 6.5 mi
  A concentration camp on twice-taken ground, where the United States imprisoned more than eleven thousand of its own.
• Alabama Hills — 18 mi
  Rounded golden granite under the Sierra wall, and Hollywoods oldest outdoor set.
• Mount Whitney — 19 mi
  At 14,505 feet, the highest summit in the contiguous United States, eighty miles from the lowest point.

More markers nearby

• Site of Putnam's Cabin — 4.0 mi
• Mary Austin's Home — 4.1 mi
• Camp Independence (Fort) — 5.2 mi
• Manzanar Relocation Center — 6.5 mi