Ryan, CA – Borax Mining Camp

Ryan, California, established in 1914 by the Pacific Coast Borax Company (PCB), was a pivotal center for borax mining in Death Valley. Serving as a company town for six underground mines collectively known as the Hillside Group, Ryan relied on a network of tramways and a narrow 24-inch-gauge railroad, the Baby Gauge, to transport borate ore to its facilities. From there, ore was shipped 20 miles via the 36-inch-gauge Death Valley Railroad (DVRR) to a processing center at Death Valley Junction.

The town’s early layout was shaped by the terrain and the DVRR right-of-way, with structures adapted to steep slopes using retaining walls, platforms, and post-and-pier foundations. Many buildings were constructed on-site with materials delivered by the railroad, while others, like the iconic Rec Hall, were relocated from abandoned mining camps and towns such as Rhyolite, Nevada, and defunct PCB properties, reflecting Ryan’s resourceful and dynamic evolution.

A view of Ryan from the Upper Biddy McCarthy mine looking down the skip track ca. 1917. – Courtesy NPS

The 1920s were a period of much growth and activity at Ryan and its vicinity as PCB embarked on a push toward modernization of the Ryan facilities. Much of the camp underwent restructuring with the remodeling of extant buildings (such as the Hospital, Powerhouse, Store, and original Boarding House) and the addition of new buildings (such as two large miners’ bunkhouses, Schoolhouse, Warehouse, and state-of-the-art management houses). Camp infrastructure also improved at this time with the construction of massive dry-laid rock terraces, better-defined road networks, and improved water and sewer systems including indoor plumbing, steam heat, and an ice plant. PCB had envisioned Ryan as the center of its mining operations for years to come.

In 1928, PCB officially shifted its focus from Ryan and the Hillside Group to the more accessible Kramer deposit at Boron, CA. By then, PCB had extracted over $30 million worth of borates from its Death Valley mines, marking the biggest and most profitable mining venture in Death Valley and the Amargosa country.

Seeing the rise in Death Valley tourism and loath to abandon its many Ryan assets, PCB and its tourist branch, the Death Valley Hotel Company, seized the opportunity to use Ryan for tourist accommodations and remodeled the camp into the Death Valley View Hotel. It converted the two large bunkhouses into hotel rooms by adding bathrooms and lobby areas, changed the original boarding house/dining area into a hotel lobby/dining room, and configured management housing into guest cottages. A tennis court was also added. Industrial structures, such as a set of giant timber ore bins in the center of the camp, were removed and the Baby Gauge rail line was outfitted as a tourist train. A partnership with Union Pacific Railroad guaranteed visitors to the camp on their journey to Death Valley; tourists would arrive by rail on the DVRR, stay at the Death Valley View Hotel, and then tour Death Valley by motor coaches driven by Union Pacific employees.

The Death Valley View Hotel, with tennis court, ca. 1930

Around this same time, PCB’s focus on Death Valley as a tourist destination led it to pursue National Park designation. Stephen T. Mather, a former promotions manager for PCB, left the borax industry to work for the Secretary of the Interior in 1915 and became the first director of the National Park Service in 1917. Working closely with Horace Albright, Mather aimed to improve and expand the National Park system and never forgot his experiences with the Death Valley borax industry. He was instrumental in the formation of the National Parks as we know them today. In 1927, Mather and Albright met with PCB officials R.C. Baker and C.B. Zabriskie to discuss Death Valley’s potential as a tourist destination; the PCB officials expressed their wish that the company’s Death Valley holdings be incorporated into the National Park system. This did not come to be until 1933, when Death Valley became a National Monument following years of PCB advocacy ranging from magazine articles to the development of a radio show, Death Valley Days.

Tourist map of Death Valley created and distributed by the Death Valley Hotel Company, promoting its lodging facilities and highlighting points of interest, ca. 1928

Despite its role in supporting the burgeoning Death Valley tourism industry, the Death Valley View Hotel ceased operation as a full-time hotel in 1930. This was largely a result of the decommissioning and removal of the DVRR. Ryan had depended on the railroad for water shipments from Death Valley Junction, but once it was removed, all of the camp’s water was trucked to the site from the U.S. Borax held water right at the local Navel Spring. The difficulty in obtaining water, along with the removal of Ryan as a “first stop” for tourists coming to Death Valley, negatively affected the Death Valley View Hotel’s business. Hotel records indicate that the Death Valley View Hotel operated on a limited basis until the 1950s, often acting as overflow for other area hotels when tourist traffic peaked.

Pacific Coast Borax merged with another company to become U.S. Borax in 1956 and eventually placed Ryan on “care and maintenance” status, employing several individuals as caretakers of the Ryan property over the years. Caretakers’ duties ranged from camp maintenance, security, hosting school groups, mining at local mines and mining claim assessment work, to hauling water and maintaining the Navel Spring water works.

Even with its “mothball” status, activity at Ryan continued into the 1970s. During the 1950s, Ryan provided the location for several filming events. Seven episodes of the PCB-produced series Death Valley Days and one episode of the television series The Twilight Zone were filmed at Ryan. In addition, the opening scenes of the Universal film Spartacus (1960) starring Kirk Douglas and Peter Ustinov and directed by Stanley Kubrick were filmed at Ryan, with the camp’s rocky hills as stand-ins for the mines of Libya.

Screenshot of the opening sequence of Spartacus showing Spartacus Ridge

In a further illustration of its versatility, Ryan was chosen in 1962 by California’s Civil Defense Commission to house a Civil Defense fallout shelter due to its remote location and extensive underground workings. In late 1962, the Ryan Haulage Tunnel was identified as a fallout shelter and an adjacent space excavated to store supplies. The shelter was officially decommissioned in the 1970s.

In 2009, Ryan became a Rio Tinto (now the parent company of U.S. Borax) legacy property, and in 2013, Rio Tinto donated Ryan and roughly 300 encompassing acres to the nonprofit group the Death Valley Conservancy (DVC). DVC is committed to the long-term preservation, restoration, and protection of Ryan.

Celebrating The Key To Ryan Being Passed from Rio Tinto to the Death Valley Conservancy – Copyright Merilee Mitchell

The ultimate goal for Ryan is for it to function as a living laboratory, supporting scientific research and education in historic preservation, archaeology, history, and the biological and physical sciences. All stabilization, restoration, and other construction activities occur under the auspices of the Secretary of the Interior’s Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties, Standards and Guidelines for Archaeology and Historic Preservation, and Guidelines for the Treatment of Cultural Landscapes; each preservation, restoration, and construction project occurs with the utmost care and consideration for the integrity of historic buildings, structures, and features. General public access and education is supported via special events, periodic guided tours, publications, and interpretive displays.

An overview of the Ryan Historic District which appears much as it did in 1930

In early 2024, the Ryan Historic District, which includes Ryan, two of its associated mines and other significant cultural resources, was nominated to the National Register of Historic Places. The district’s 22 buildings, 16 archaeological sites, 22 structures, and 1 object are eligible for inclusion on the National Register under Criterion A (Events) on the local level for its association with the early twentieth-century Death Valley borax mining industry, the nascent Death Valley National Park tourism business, 1950s location filming, and the Cold War-era civil defense program. It is also locally significant under Criterion C (Architecture and Engineering) for embodying the distinctive, yet cohesive, characteristics of early twentieth-century corporate vernacular-style architecture as well as ingenuity in engineering. Finally, it is locally significant under Criterion D (Archaeology) for its immense quantity and pristine quality of archaeological remains that have yielded and will likely yield important information about the Death Valley borax mining industry, tourism, location filming, and the U.S. civil defense program.

In November 2024, the California State Historic Resources Commission recommended that the Ryan Historic District be included on the National Register of Historic Places and it was officially listed by the National Park Service’s Keeper of the Register on January 27, 2025.

With this designation, Ryan is now officially recognized as one of the most significant and enduring historic borax mining operations in Death Valley, the state of California, and perhaps North America. It also underscores the DVC’s ongoing commitment to preserve and protect this American treasure.