Kern County Virtual History Tour
Alfred P. Clark, Ph.D., Instructor

Why take a virtual tour? There are many books on Kern County (see below), so why not just read them instead of taking the tour? The books have more information and have been checked for errors, certified by their publishers and the librarians who decided to include them in their collections. They remain the best sources for Kern County history. Yet there is a place for a virtual tour--to introduce educators (and others) to the history of Kern County and to motivate them to read more about Kern County, to visit the museums of Kern County, and to tour historic Kern County sites. This short tour allows the virtual tourist to learn a little about the history, museums, and sites of Kern County as a first step toward reading some of the many tomes on Kern, on the one hand, and following the trails blazed by historic county figures, on the other. This virtual tour should launch participants into a further exploration of the past, present, and future of the largest county in California's great Central Valley. The virtual tour is not designed to be an end in itself but rather should be the beginning of an in-person tour.

How does one take the virtual tour? One takes it by reading through each of the 15 chronological excursions on the tour (see below) and exploring some or all of the links that are found on each excursion. During the tour participants will probably want to consult books on the list of Books on Kern County History and may be inspired to visit some of the museums and sites on the list of Museums and Sites on Kern County History. In this way the tour should become a hands-on activity as well as a virtual one.

There are two significant problems with taking a virtual tour. First, there is no way to be certain of the accuracy of what is found on the Web. Anyone can put anything on the Web (and they do!), and there are few editors and no librarians on the Web to certify its contents. The instructor who created this virtual tour has examined critically the materials used in the tour, but it is not possible for him to check the accuracy of every fact that is given and every statement that is made on the pages included in the tour. The virtual tourist must carefully weigh what is presented, too, even more carefully than when reading a book or newspaper. The perceptive virtual tourist will discover that "facts" on one webpage sometimes contradict "facts" on other pages. Second, what is presented in museums, on the Web, and at historic sites is what interests the curators, writers, and caretakers, not necessarily what is most significant historically. Often the unique and the exotic find more space than the ordinary and the common. For example, in the development of Kern County few factors have been more important than agriculture and water. Whereas Father Garcés is honored on five California Historic Markers, however, and the short-lived Butterfield Stage Line on six, no markers have been erected to significant events in agriculture or water development. None of the museums in Kern County deal much with water or agriculture, either, not even Kern County Museum with its extensive collection of buildings and equipment. Similarly, on the Web, the Bakersfield Californian's extensive and impressive Bakersfield Centennial coverage includes tens of pages on bandits, ballplayers, earthquakes, fires, and floods, but only two webpages on agriculture and none devoted to 20th century water development. It does not appear that any of the centennial pages even mention the critical Central Valley Project. In taking the Virtual Tour of Kern County, therefore, the tourist need to keep in mind the limitations of the medium.

Further exploration of Kern County history requires reading of Books on Kern County History and travel to Museums and Sites on Kern County History. Of all the works noted on the select list of Books on Kern County History, the most comprehensive and available are the following:

Bailey, Richard C.

Explorations in Kern. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1962.

Bailey, Richard C.

Heritage of Kern. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1957.

Blanford, Louise.

A History of Kern County Library. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1967.

Boyd, William Harland.

Kern County Wayfarers, 1844-1881. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1977.

Boyd, William Harland.

Lower Kern River Country 1850-1950: Wilderness to Empire. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1997.

Boyd, William Harland, Ludeke, John, and Rump, Marjorie, eds.

Inside Historic Kern. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1982.

Burmeister, Eugene.

The Golden Empire: Kern County, California. Beverly Hills, California: Autograph Press, 1977.

Kreiser, Ralph F., and Hunt, Thomas.

Kern County Panorama. Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1961.

Maynard, John Arthur.

Bakersfield: A Centennial Portrait. Encino, California: Cherbo, 1997.

Robinson, W.W.

The Story of Kern County. Bakersfield, California: Title Insurance and Trust Co.,1961.

In order that the authority of those who will guide the virtual tour can be evaluated, below are a few brief biographies of writers the tourist will encounter along the way. About half of the virtual history tour of Kern County is hosted by the Bakersfield Californian which has placed several score articles on the Web about the history and development of Kern County, many written especially for the Bakersfield Centennial in 1998. Most of these articles have by-lines, but only one has a biography of the author.

Harland Boyd.

Emeritus Professor of History and emeritus chairman of the History Department at Bakersfield College, Dr. Boyd earned his Ph.D. in history from the University of California, Berkeley, and for 43 years edited the Kern County Historical Society's Historic Kern bulletin. The Bakersfield Californian's biographical sketch called him the Walking Encyclopedia

Chris Brewer.

The great, great grandson of Colonel Thomas Baker, whose pasture for travelers' animals grew into the largest city in Kern County, Mr. Brewer grows oranges commercially and writes history as an avocation. His thumbnail autobiography can be found at the end of his sketch of his well-known forebear, How Bakersfield Got Its Name.

William Hample.

Author of books on touring, motoring, and mechanical shock and vibration theory, Mr. Hample, a registered mechanical engineer, assumed the presidency of the Kern County Historical Society in 1991. His personal sketch can be found in his Historical Site Markers Kern County (Bakersfield, California: Kern County Historical Society, 1991) on page 159.

Robert Price.

Apparently the only Bakersfield Californian reporter to include a biography among the Bakersfield history webpages, Mr. Price "has covered governement, the oil industry, growth and development, telecommunications, entertainment and sports" for the newspaper for a decade. Not inappropriately, he tooted his own horn during his coverage of Bakersfield Sound.