This is fresh in my mind, so I’ma write on it. It’s a story of the American Dream…kinda? And how no one tells you that your hard work may be exploited by someone else wanting to get rich.

This story actually starts in 1966, when I was but a twinkle in, well, ANYONE’S eye. My mother hadn’t been in Los Angeles but a few years, and my stepdad had a dream of…something.

See, the story goes that some people got the idea that they could build another Los Angeles in the desert between LA and Vegas. With the proper infrastructure, they could attract millions of people, and they offered people the opportunity to buy lots to get in on this new growth opportunity.

Dad took that opportunity.

Mom and Dad got married in 1980, and Dad had apparently made allusions to “some land I got in the desert”. Mom says she would ask if he wanted to go out there, but he never wanted to. She got the feeling he ws ashamed, somehow.

Anyway, Dad continued to pay property taxes and kept telling my mom that he’d handle it.Mom didn’t press him; taxes looked to be about $100 a year, and we were doing okay. But every now and again, she’d mention it, and Dad would get mad.

I had no idea this existed until after college. I remember calling home, and Dad being really aggravated, and Mom explaining that someone had offered him money for the property, but he felt the price was too low and he was being taken advantage of. I found out then where it was, but didn’t want to ask anything else because Dad was PISSED.

So, after Dad died, Mom is going through his papers, and finds out more details. In 1966, Dad bought a plot of land in the desert for $3390, and had agreed to pay at least $30 a month. I’m sure it got paid off in 50 years, and he had paid property taxes religiously. But shortly after he died, Mom got a tax bill and had refused to pay it. Shortly after, we got a letter in the mail offering us CASH MONEY FOR YOUR DESERT PROPERTY, which made me look a little closer. Mom decided she didn’t feel like looking into it anymore, so we didn’t.

Lately, I’ve been trying to get more stuff in order so Mom doesn’t have to worry about it, so I took this project on; get rid of this land. Mom sent me the papers she could find, and I started looking things up.

Whoooo boy. First I found this article, which details a timeline of the whole operation.

Then, someone had done some investigative work, and found out some more REALLY interesting facts.

So, it’s with this knowledge that I proceed to figure out where to go and what to do. This is going to be a mess.

I have no idea what Dad was thinking, 50 years after he bought this plot of useless land. Maybe he was enamored of the sales pitch. Maybe he bought into a mini-Los Angeles. Maybe he decided he was going to see this through, and that he didn’t want to be a quitter. Mom doesn’t know, either.

The mysteries…