Another look at Darwin While Driving into Town

Darwin is an unincorporated mining community and

Census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

Inyo County, California Inyo County () is a County (United States), county in the Eastern California, eastern central part of the U.S. state of California, located between the Sierra Nevada and the state of Nevada. In the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the po ...

, United States. It is located southeast of Keeler. The population was 36 at the 2020 census, down from 43 at the 2010 census.

History

The town is named after

Darwin French Dr. Erasmus Darwin French (1822–1902)Mary Ellen SnodgrassFrench, Erasmus Darwin (1822–1902)in ''Settlers of the American West: The Lives of 231 Notable Pioneers'', McFarland, 2015. Page 61. was an American man of adventure. He was born in N ...

(1822–1902), a local rancher, miner, and explorer. According to Erwin Gudde, French of Fort Tejon was with a party of prospectors in the area during the fall of 1850. French also led a party into

Death Valley Death Valley is a desert valley in Eastern California, in the northern Mojave Desert, bordering the Great Basin Desert. It is thought to be the Highest temperature recorded on Earth, hottest place on Earth during summer. Death Valley's Badwat ...

in 1860 to search for the mythical Gunsight Lode via the local wash, lending his first name to the wash, canyon, and future town. Silver and lead discovery at the place led to the founding of a settlement in 1874. A post office opened in 1875, closed for a time in 1902, and remains open. The town prospered when Eichbaum Toll Road opened in 1926, opening Death Valley from the west. When Death Valley became a National Monument in 1933, it was decided to buy the toll road to allow free access to the new park. In 1937, a new cutoff bypassed Darwin, isolating the town. The town was the subject of a 2011 documentary film ''Darwin''. In April 2012,

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...

featured a video of local residents describing their wishes to replace

dial-up Internet access Dial-up Internet access is a form of Internet access that uses the facilities of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) to establish a connection to an Internet service provider (ISP) by dialing a telephone number on a conventional telepho ...

with

broadband In telecommunications, broadband or high speed is the wide-bandwidth (signal processing), bandwidth data transmission that exploits signals at a wide spread of frequencies or several different simultaneous frequencies, and is used in fast Inter ...

Geography

According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the CDP has a total area of , all of it land. The census definition of the area was created by the Census Bureau for statistical purposes and may not precisely correspond to local understanding of the area with the same name.

Demographics

Darwin first appeared as a

census designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...

in the 2000 U.S. Census. The 2020 United States census reported that Darwin had a population of 36. The population density was . The racial makeup of Darwin was 34 (94%)

non-Hispanic white Non-Hispanic Whites, also referred to as White Anglo Americans or Non-Latino Whites, are White Americans who are classified by the United States census as "White" and not of Hispanic or Latino origin. According to annual estimates from the Unit ...

and 2 (6%) Native American. The whole population lived in households. There were 24 households, out of which 4 (17%) had children under the age of 18 living in them, 8 (33%) were married-couple households, 6 (25%) had a female householder with no partner present, and 10 (42%) had a male householder with no partner present. 11 households (45.8%) were one person, and 6 (25.0%) were one person aged 65 or older. The average household size was 1.5. There were 10

families Family (from ) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictability, structure, and safety as ...

(41.7% of all households). The age distribution was 0 people (0%) under the age of 18, 1 person (3%) aged 18 to 24, 6 people (17%) aged 25 to 44, 18 people (50%) aged 45 to 64, and 11 people (31%) who were 65years of age or older. The median age was 61.5years. There were 25 males and 11 females. There were 46 housing units at an average density of , of which 24 (52%) were occupied. Of these, 14 (58%) were owner-occupied, and 10 (42%) were occupied by renters.

Government

In the

state legislature A state legislature is a Legislature, legislative branch or body of a State (country subdivision), political subdivision in a Federalism, federal system. Two federations literally use the term "state legislature": * The legislative branches of ...

, Darwin is in , and . Federally, Darwin is in .

History

Geography

Demographics

Government

See also

References

Further reading