Rovana 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 ...

Inyo County Inyo County () is a county in the eastern central part of the U.S. state of California, located between the Sierra Nevada and the state of Nevada. In the 2020 census, the population was 19,016. The county seat is Independence. Inyo County is o ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

. It is located at the western edge of

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 ...

, north-northeast of Mount Tom, at an elevation of 5141 feet (1567 m).

History

Rovana was established in 1947, when the US Vanadium corporation purchased the former Foreman Ranch near the mouth of Pine Creek Canyon as a housing site for workers at their high-altitude Pine Creek Mine, which had expanded due to military demand for tungsten during World War II. By 1951 there were 85 houses in Rovana and later another 50, all still in use. Most were transported there from further up the canyon, where earlier mine-worker housing was vulnerable to heavy snow, avalanches, earthquakes, and mud slides. The name came from "Ro" for Round Valley and "vana" for US Vanadium. The streets were named from states of the Union matching the letters in "Vanadium" (such as Nevada, Utah, and Montana). The village of

Scheelite Scheelite is a calcium tungstate mineral with the chemical formula Ca W O4. It is an important ore of tungsten (wolfram). Scheelite is originally named after Swedish chemist K. Scheele (1742-1786). Well-formed crystals are sought by collectors a ...

, located closer to the Pine Creek Mine, was another company town for the mine.

Climate

This region experiences warm (but not hot) and dry summers, with no average monthly temperatures above 71.6 °F. According to the

Köppen Climate Classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

system, Rovana has a

warm-summer Mediterranean climate A Mediterranean climate (also called a dry summer temperate climate ''Cs'') is a temperate climate sub-type, generally characterized by warm, dry summers and mild, fairly wet winters; these weather conditions are typically experienced in the ...

, abbreviated "Csb" on climate maps.Climate Summary for Rovana, California
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References

Unincorporated communities in Inyo County, California Owens Valley Unincorporated communities in California {{InyoCountyCA-geo-stub