Diaries of Calico Ghost Town legend to be unveiled with Wild West games, food at Mojave River Valley Museum BBQ

The Mojave River Valley Museum is nearing six decades in a nook of Barstow as a pillar for research and preservation of High Desert history.

And if that role isn't enough, it's also the purveyor of a yearly food-and-fun bonanza nearly as old as the museum itself. This weekend marks the newest iteration, and it's rolling out the red carpet for a uniquely-spooky artifact as one of many attractions for attendants of all ages.

The museum is holding its 55th annual Bar-B-Que and Open House fundraiser — the museum is 58 years old — from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at 270 E., Virginia Way, across from Dana Park Community Center in Barstow.

Tickets for food are $9 per adult and $4 per kid, but plenty of offerings beyond that are free of charge, according to Mojave River Valley Museum committee chairwoman Pat Schoffstall.

Schoffstall named numerous staples of the annual event that will give people a taste of the Old West: self-guided railcar tours; a blacksmith; a rope-maker and weaver; a site to sample locally-produced moonshine; "a campfire with sourdough biscuits in the dutch oven."

Perhaps the most eccentric item attendants can expect is a relic of a legend in the history of Calico Ghost Town and the broader lore of paranormal activity: Nearly five decades' worth of diaries written by Lucy Bell Lane, who became famous in life as the last resident of Calico — and in death as the entity most commonly-sighted by visitors and spiritual mediums haunting its ghost-town remains to this day.

Schoffstall says the Mojave River Valley Museum recently got its hands on the diaries, which span Lane's writings from 1920 until she died in 1967, and will be unveiling them on display Saturday.

Saturday's events will also include an opportunity drawing will be held at 2 p.m. with "dozens of prizes," per a flyer for the event, with the top prize being $500 cash. Live music and a photographer will be roaming the premises to capture shots people can take home as a memento. Schoffstall said these photos will be free, though the museum will tempt those feeling generous with their cash.

"We're giving the pictures away, but we will give them away right beside a big donation jar, so that's a choice there," she said.

The Mojave River Valley Museum is one of many that closed its doors with the onset of COVID-19 in 2020, only to return with a build-up of work to do and fewer volunteers than ever to help do it. It reopened in April 2021 and launched a volunteer-recruiting effort a few months later that Schoffstall summed up by saying: "We just need so much help."

Funding is as scarce as volunteers at Barstow museums these days, personnel at the sites have said. In turn, Schoffstall says all donations collected at the event will pay directly for the critical functions of Mojave River Valley Museum and its ability to share history with visitors any day of the week.

Charlie McGee covers California’s High Desert for the Daily Press, focusing on the city of Barstow and its surrounding communities. He is also a Report for America corps member with The GroundTruth Project, an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit news organization dedicated to supporting the next generation of journalists in the U.S. and around the world. McGee may be reached at 760-955-5341 or cmcgee@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @bycharliemcgee.

This article originally appeared on Victorville Daily Press: Calico ghost diaries to be unveiled at Mojave River Valley Museum BBQ