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Bishop is a city in Inyo County, California – at the foothill of Eastern Sierra. It was named for one of the first white settlers in the area, Samuel A. Bishop. Owens Lake was named for Richard Owens a member of John C. Fremont's 1845 exploration party which included Kit Carson and Ed Kern. Later the entire valley became known as The Owens Valley (see First Settlers below). The Paiute Indians called Owens Lake by the name of "Pacheta" and the Owens River" Wakopee."
Inyo County today is the second largest county in California with a population of slightly over 17,000 residents. The county is so big that several eastern states put together would fit neatly within its' boundaries. Inyo County contains the both the highest and lowest points in the contiguous United States; Mt. Whitney, 14,496 feet above sea level, and Badwater in Death Valley, 282 feet below sea level. A difference of nearly 15,000 feet.
The "Inyo" in Inyo County is commonly believed to be a Paiute word meaning "dwelling place of the great spirit," although some scholars are now convinced that it is a mistranslation of the word, " Indio," Spanish for Indian. It is possible that the Paiute were trying to explain to the earliest English speaking settlers in the Owens Valley that this was their land by using a form of "Indio" they had learned from other Indian tribes, who in turn, had learned it from the Spanish or Mexicans, not realizing that not all white men spoke the same language. Thus Inyo may actually mean "Indian Land."
The first white American explorers in the Owens Valley of Eastern California included the famous mountain men Jedediah Smith in 1826 and Joseph Walker in 1834. This remote area of California had never been explored by the Spanish and even though it was shown as Mexican territory on early maps, the Eastern Sierra region remained unvisited by them. Present day Walker Lake in western Nevada, the Walker River on the California/Nevada border and Walker Pass in the southern Sierra were named for their discoverer, Joseph Walker.
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