Lake Hughes is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...

in northern

Los Angeles County, California Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the List of the most populous counties in the United States, most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, ...

. It is in the

Sierra Pelona Mountains The Sierra Pelona, also known as the Sierra Pelona Ridge or the Sierra Pelona Mountains, is a mountain ridge in the Transverse Ranges in Southern California. Located in northwest Los Angeles County, the ridge is bordered on the north by the San An ...

, northwest of

Palmdale Palmdale is a city in northern Los Angeles County in the U.S. state of California. The city lies in the Antelope Valley region of Southern California. The San Gabriel Mountains separate Palmdale from the Los Angeles Basin to the south. On Aug ...

and north of the

Santa Clarita Valley The Santa Clarita Valley (SCV) is part of the upper watershed of the Santa Clara River in Southern California. The valley was part of the Rancho San Francisco Mexican land grant. Located in Los Angeles County, its main population center is the ...

, in the

Angeles National Forest The Angeles National Forest (ANF) of the United States Forest Service, U.S. Forest Service is located in the San Gabriel Mountains and Sierra Pelona Mountains, primarily within Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County in southern Calif ...

. It is on the sag pond waters of

Lake Hughes Lake Hughes is an unincorporated community in northern Los Angeles County, California. It is in the Sierra Pelona Mountains, northwest of Palmdale and north of the Santa Clarita Valley, in the Angeles National Forest. It is on the sag pond wate ...

and Elizabeth Lake. The community is rural in character, with a population of 649 in 2010, but also has a strong recreational element centered on the three lakes in the vicinity. The community of Elizabeth Lake is located just east of Lake Hughes, sharing the same ZIP code.

History

Nearby Elizabeth Lake, known then as ''La Laguna de Chico Lopez'', was a watering locale on Spanish colonial and Mexican

El Camino Viejo El Camino Viejo a Los Ángeles ( en, the Old Road to Los Angeles), also known as El Camino Viejo and the Old Los Angeles Trail, was the oldest north-south trail in the interior of Spanish colonial Las Californias (1769–1822) and Mexican Alta Cali ...

Alta California Alta California ('Upper California'), also known as ('New California') among other names, was a province of New Spain, formally established in 1804. Along with the Baja California peninsula, it had previously comprised the province of , but ...

and the Gold Rush era

Stockton – Los Angeles Road Stockton may refer to: Places Australia * Stockton, New South Wales * Stockton, Queensland, a locality in the Cassowary Coast Region New Zealand *Stockton, New Zealand United Kingdom *Stockton, Cheshire *Stockton, Norfolk *Stockton, Chirbu ...

. From 1858 to 1861, Lake Hughes was on the route of the

Butterfield Overland Mail Butterfield Overland Mail (officially the Overland Mail Company)Waterman L. Ormsby, edited by Lyle H. Wright and Josephine M. Bynum, "The Butterfield Overland Mail", The Huntington Library, San Marino, California, 1991. was a stagecoach service i ...

, between the

Widow Smith's Station Widow Smith's Station, also known as Major Gordon's Station and Clayton's Station, was a stagecoach station of the Butterfield Overland Mail 1st Division from 1858 to 1861 in southern California. Geography The station was on the Stockton - Los An ...

and Mud Spring stage stops. The lake area was to the west of

Rancho La Liebre Rancho La Liebre was a Mexican land grant in present-day Kern County, California and Los Angeles County, given in 1846 by Governor Pío Pico to José María Flores. Liebre means "Hare" in Spanish and the rancho was named as such because of the ab ...

, an 1846 Mexican land grant now part of

Tejon Ranch Tejon Ranch Company (), based in Lebec, California, is one of the largest private landowners in California. The company was incorporated in 1936 to organize the ownership of a large tract of land that was consolidated from four Mexican land gr ...

. Lake Hughes was named for Judge Griffith (Patrick) Hughes, who homesteaded the area around the turn of the 20th century. Settlers were drawn to the area because water was more plentiful than in the drier Antelope Valley. In 1907

William Mulholland William Mulholland (September 11, 1855 – July 22, 1935) was an Irish Americans, Irish American self-taught civil engineer who was responsible for building the infrastructure to provide a water supply that allowed Los Angeles to grow into the la ...

, superintendent of the

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) is the largest municipal utility in the United States with 8,100 megawatts of electric generating capacity (2021-2022) and delivering an average of 435 million gallons of water per day to more ...

, started work on the Elizabeth Lake Tunnel for transporting water in the

Los Angeles Aqueduct The Los Angeles Aqueduct system, comprising the Los Angeles Aqueduct (Owens Valley aqueduct) and the Second Los Angeles Aqueduct, is a water conveyance system, built and operated by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power. The Owens Valley ...

from

Owens Valley Owens Valley (Numic Numic is a branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. It includes seven languages spoken by Native American peoples traditionally living in the Great Basin, Colorado River basin, Snake River basin, and southern Great Pl ...

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...

. Less than a half a mile east of Lake Hughes, the five-mile-long (8 km) tunnel is under the valley floor. The tunnel was driven from both ends. The north portal is at Fairmont Reservoir and the south in Bear Canyon (now Portal Canyon) just off of Green Valley. This 11-foot-wide (3.4 m) tunnel was driven through solid rock and met in the center within 1½ inches (3.8 cm) in line and ⅝ inches (1.6 cm) in depth. Work was around the clock and averaged about per day. The Elizabeth Lake Tunnel was the largest single construction project on the Los Angeles Aqueduct and set speed records in its day. C.A. Austin promoted Lake Hughes as a summer resort in 1924, as a "fine mountain resort on the edge of Antelope Valley." The 2020 Lake fire was also first reported here.

Geography

Lake Hughes is generally centered on the intersection of Elizabeth Lake Road and Lake Hughes Road, both of which are county highways. Hughes Lake and Munz Lakes are located within the community. In addition, a third lake, Lake Elizabeth is located just to the east within the community of Elizabeth Lake. Lakes Hughes and Lake Elizabeth are in the canyons along the

San Andreas Fault The San Andreas Fault is a continental transform fault that extends roughly through California. It forms the tectonics, tectonic boundary between the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate, and its motion is Fault (geology)#Strike-slip fau ...

. Both lakes periodically dry up depending on rainfall cycles. Lake Hughes was previously known as West Elizabeth Lake.

Government and associations

The

Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD), officially the County of Los Angeles Sheriff's Department, is a law enforcement agency serving Los Angeles County, California. LASD is the largest sheriff's department in the United States a ...

(LASD) operates the Palmdale Station in

, serving Lake Hughes. Lake Hughes has its own community town council, The Lakes Town Council, which meets twice a month at the Lakes Community Center. The council helps plan community events (such as the yearly 49ers day festival and parade), hosts socials and mixers, and works with

Los Angeles County Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, with 9,861,224 residents estimated as of 2022. It is the ...

officials on community planning and community standards. There are many clubs and associations within the Lake Hughes and Elizabeth Lake area. The most prominent is the Ranch Club, the town's country club and golf course. It has been open for over 60 years. The clubhouse incorporates the historic Frakes homestead of Samuel H. T. Frakes and Almeda Mudgett Frakes which was once a way station along the old stagecoach route. Others include the Lakes Women's Club, The Go for Fun Club, Lakes And Valleys Conservancy Group, Lakes & Valleys Art Guild, Fire Safe Council and the Lakes Baseball & Softball Teams.

Demographics

The

2010 United States Census The United States census of 2010 was the twenty-third United States national census. National Census Day, the reference day used for the census, was April 1, 2010. The census was taken via mail-in citizen self-reporting, with enumerators servin ...

reported that Lake Hughes had a population of 649. The population density was . The racial makeup of Lake Hughes was 544 (83.8%)

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White on ...

(77.5% Non-Hispanic White), 19 (2.9%)

African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of ens ...

, 7 (1.1%) Native American, 5 (0.8%)

Asian Asian may refer to: * Items from or related to the continent of Asia: ** Asian people, people in or descending from Asia ** Asian culture, the culture of the people from Asia ** Asian cuisine, food based on the style of food of the people from Asi ...

, 1 (0.2%)

Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe the original p ...

, 54 (8.3%) from

other races Other often refers to: * Other (philosophy), a concept in psychology and philosophy Other or The Other may also refer to: Film and television * ''The Other'' (1913 film), a German silent film directed by Max Mack * ''The Other'' (1930 film), a ...

, and 19 (2.9%) from two or more races.

Hispanic The term ''Hispanic'' ( es, hispano) refers to people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or Hispanidad. The term commonly applies to countries with a cultural and historical link to Spain and to Vic ...

Latino Latino or Latinos most often refers to: * Latino (demonym), a term used in the United States for people with cultural ties to Latin America * Hispanic and Latino Americans in the United States * The people or cultures of Latin America; ** Latin A ...

of any race were 104 persons (16.0%). The Census reported that 626 people (96.5% of the population) lived in households, 23 (3.5%) lived in non-institutionalized group quarters, and 0 (0%) were institutionalized. There were 300 households, out of which 55 (18.3%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 114 (38.0%) were opposite-sex married couples living together, 26 (8.7%) had a female householder with no husband present, 16 (5.3%) had a male householder with no wife present. There were 23 (7.7%) unmarried opposite-sex partnerships, and 4 (1.3%) same-sex married couples or partnerships. 111 households (37.0%) were made up of individuals, and 26 (8.7%) had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.09. There were 156

families Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Ideall ...

(52.0% of all households); the average family size was 2.76. The population was spread out, with 105 people (16.2%) under the age of 18, 53 people (8.2%) aged 18 to 24, 143 people (22.0%) aged 25 to 44, 273 people (42.1%) aged 45 to 64, and 75 people (11.6%) who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 46.9 years. For every 100 females, there were 104.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 100.0 males. There were 400 housing units at an average density of , of which 175 (58.3%) were owner-occupied, and 125 (41.7%) were occupied by renters. The homeowner vacancy rate was 4.9%; the rental vacancy rate was 9.9%. 381 people (58.7% of the population) lived in owner-occupied housing units and 245 people (37.8%) lived in rental housing units. According to the 2010 United States Census, Lake Hughes had a median household income of $53,281, with 29.0% of the population living below the federal poverty line.

Education

In 1869 the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors designated Elizabeth Lake School District to serve the area. Its school was the only one between

and

Bakersfield Bakersfield is a city in Kern County, California, United States. It is the county seat and largest city of Kern County. The city covers about near the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley and the Central Valley region. Bakersfield's populat ...

. A wooden structure was built that lasted until it was replaced in the early 1930s by the adobe structure on the east side of Elizabeth Lake Road, a quarter mile north of Andrada Corner (intersection of San Francisquito and Elizabeth Lake Roads). The district's name was changed to Hughes-Elizabeth Lakes Union School District.

The Hughes-Elizabeth Lakes Union Elementary School District is a California Distinguished School and serves kindergarten through 8th grade students. Children from the communities of Lake Hughes, Elizabeth Lake and Green Valley, as well as parts of Leona Valley and Pine Canyon, make up the student population, which is 81% White, 11% Hispanic and 8% other ethnic groups. The district has an approximate enrollment of 330 students.

Notable residents

In the spring of 1947

Roy Rogers Roy Rogers (born Leonard Franklin Slye; November 5, 1911 – July 6, 1998) was an American singer, actor, and television host. Following early work under his given name, first as co-founder of the Sons of the Pioneers and then acting, the rebra ...

purchased a new retreat at Lake Hughes. He named his home the "Sky Haven Ranch" and it is still referred to as this today. Cheryl Rogers, the first Rogers child of school age, began 1st grade at Lake Hughes School. The school was a large one-room house "up the school road" (a dirt road) from the trading post, which consisted of the post office and a filling station.Roy Rogers: A Biography, Radio History, Television Career Chronicle, Discography, Filmography, Comicography, Merchandising and Advertising History. Pages 31–33

References

External links

*
Lakes Community CenterHughes Elizabeth Lakes Union School
* {{authority control Unincorporated communities in Los Angeles County, California Populated places in the Mojave Desert Sierra Pelona Ridge Angeles National Forest Populated places established in 1873 1873 establishments in California Unincorporated communities in California