Camp Cajon was a motorists’ rest stop in the Route 66 Cajon Pass from 1919 to 1938, (it was severely damaged in the flood of 1938) built on National Old Trails Road, the United States’ first “Ocean to Ocean Highway,” which opened in 1912 to serve the newly motorized American population.
National Old Trails Road became U.S. Route 66 in 1926, and Camp Cajon became famous as “the gateway into Southern California.”
At a time when long-distance auto travel was still relatively new, Camp Cajon became a nationally known rest stop along an important route into southern California. For travelers during the 1920s and 1930s -- long before the era of interstates, rest areas, and ubiquitous hotel chains and fast food restaurants -- Camp Cajon provided a roadside stopping place, complete with facilities for eating, camping, and much more.
“The camp was created primarily,” said Mr. Kendall, “for accommodation of tourists and travelers, and incidentally, we expected the people of San Bernardino and the valley to use the camp.
In March 1922, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors ordered the camp to be closed to pleasure parties every evening at 9, after receiving complaints about late-night joyriders and “wild parties.”
“We have received numerous complaints that joyriders were frequenting the camp, disturbing the campers and ‘raising a roughhouse.’ Many of the parties were composed of intoxicated girls and youths, who sought to evade recognizance in the seclusion of the mountain camp.”
In 1937/38, Camp Cajon's future was at a major crossroad due to the impending need to widen Route 66 which passed directly through the camp.
The County of San Bernardino and the State Highway Department would soon have to make a decision on whether the camp would be reconfigured, moved, or closed.
In March of 1938, Mother Nature narrowed the choices with an epic flood that devastated the camp and dealt a death blow to Camp Cajon, when torrents of water, rocks and debris tumbled through the Cajon Pass, and severely damaged the camp's facilities. Roads, infrastructure, buildings, and terrain throughout Southern California were severely damaged by the epic flood, and numerous lives were lost.
The deluge wreaked havoc on the coastal basins of Southern California from San Diego to San Luis Obispo, and caused heavy damage in parts of the Mojave Desert. The “100-year-flood” of 1938 is second in magnitude only to the catastrophic “500-year-flood” of 1861, considered the worst flood in California’s recorded history.
The disaster began in late January of 1938, when a pattern of nearly continual and often severe rainstorms drenched Southern California. From February 27, to March 4, rainfall in the mountain areas averaged an astonishing 22.5 inches.
The high desert was also hit hard as the Mojave River raged and burst its banks, flooding many low-lying areas with several feet of water. In the Barstow area, one person was killed, and more than 600 people were left homeless.
In San Bernardino, one police officer reported seeing 8 bodies float past the Mount Vernon Bridge over Lytle Creek. 15 people were reported drowned in Riverside as the Santa Ana River cut new channels through auto camps, and ripped away homes built near the riverbed.
The regional effects of heavy rains are amplified because the San Bernardino Valley acts as a huge drainage trough for the local mountains, funneling water into the Santa Ana River. Although barely a stream most of the year, the Santa Ana River has an enormous 2,450 square mile watershed.
As a result of the 1938 flood, the Army Corps of Engineers and local flood control agencies began an intense study of flood control in Southern California. The study resulted in the construction of a huge system of dams, channels and levies on the Santa Ana watershed.
https://www.redlandsdailyfacts.com/2022/03/18/100-years-ago-in-redlands-supervisors-crack-down-on-wild-parties-at-camp-cajon/
https://foresthistory.org/camp-cajon-californias-original-welcome-station/
https://www.facebook.com/campcajonmonument/posts/remembering-the-great-flood-of-march-1938in-193738-camp-cajons-future-was-at-a-m/2957719831129382/
https://tessa.lapl.org/cdm/search/searchterm/Camp
https://foresthistory.org/camp-cajon-californias-original-welcome-station/
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