Mud Spring, formerly called ''Aquaje Lodoso'' (muddy watering place), is a

spring Spring(s) may refer to: Common uses * Spring (season), a season of the year * Spring (device), a mechanical device that stores energy * Spring (hydrology), a natural source of water * Spring (mathematics), a geometric surface in the shape of a ...

and historic site in the western

Antelope Valley The Antelope Valley is located in northern Los Angeles County, California, and the southeast portion of Kern County, California, and constitutes the western tip of the Mojave Desert. It is situated between the Tehachapi, Sierra Pelona, and the ...

, within northern

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 ...

southern California Southern California (commonly shortened to SoCal) is a geographic and Cultural area, cultural region that generally comprises the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. It includes the Los Angeles metropolitan area, the second most po ...

. It is located the western

Mojave Desert The Mojave Desert ( ; mov, Hayikwiir Mat'aar; es, Desierto de Mojave) is a desert in the rain shadow of the Sierra Nevada mountains in the Southwestern United States. It is named for the indigenous Mojave people. It is located primarily in ...

at an elevation of , north 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 wat ...

and east of the

Tehachapi Mountains The Tehachapi Mountains (; Kawaiisu: ''Tihachipia'', meaning "hard climb") are a mountain range in the Transverse Ranges system of California in the Western United States. The range extends for approximately in southern Kern County and northwest ...

History

El Camino Viejo

Aquaje Lodoso was an aguaje, a watering place on the Spanish 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 Cal ...

inland north–south route in colonial

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 ...

. It was located between Elizabeth Lake and Cow Spring water sources. It was also a watering place on the

Old Tejon Pass The Old Tejon Pass (originally Tejon Pass) is a mountain pass in the Tehachapi Mountains linking Southern and Central California. Geography The pass is located in Kern County, California, to the northeast of the current Tejon Pass. It runs at t ...

road between the Antelope and San Joaquin Valleys in the 1840s and early 1850s until that road was replaced by the

Stockton–Los Angeles Road The Stockton–Los Angeles Road, also known as the Millerton Road, Stockton–Mariposa Road, Stockton–Fort Miller Road or the Stockton–Visalia Road, was established about 1853 following the discovery of gold on the Kern River in Old Tulare Cou ...

, a new and easier road through

Fort Tejon Pass The Tejon Pass , previously known as ''Portezuelo de Cortes'', ''Portezuela de Castac'', and Fort Tejon Pass is a mountain pass between the southwest end of the Tehachapi Mountains and northeastern San Emigdio Mountains, linking Southern Califor ...

Stockton - Los Angeles Road

The Butterfield Overland Mail 1st Division had a station operating at Mud Springs, on the

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, Chir ...

. In 1860, a correspondent of the

Daily Alta California The ''Alta California'' or ''Daily Alta California'' (often miswritten ''Alta Californian'' or ''Daily Alta Californian'') was a 19th-century San Francisco newspaper. ''California Star'' The ''Daily Alta California'' descended from the first ...

wrote an account of his travel by

stagecoach A stagecoach is a four-wheeled public transport coach used to carry paying passengers and light packages on journeys long enough to need a change of horses. It is strongly sprung and generally drawn by four horses although some versions are draw ...

to Los Angeles from San Francisco. He mentions that 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 ...

(1857-1861) had a station operating at Mud Springs in 1860. List of Butterfield Overland Mail Stations, from the New York Times, October 14 1858, "Itinerary of the Route"
/ref> It was east from French John's Station, and north from Clayton's—

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 ...

near San Francisquito Pass 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 ...

. Notes of a Trip to Los Angeles No. 1, Daily Alta California, Volume 12, Number 3888, 5 October 1860 — Page 1
/ref>

References

Antelope Valley Springs of California Former settlements in Los Angeles County, California El Camino Viejo Butterfield Overland Mail in California Stagecoach stops in the United States {{LosAngelesCountyCA-geo-stub

History

El Camino Viejo

Stockton - Los Angeles Road

See also

References