White Mountain Research Center

White Mountain Research Center (WMRC), located in the Owens Valley and White Mountains of Inyo County, includes four facilities: Cooked Creek Station, Barcroft Station, Owens Valley Laboratory, and the Summit Hut. Established in 1950, WMRC operated as an independent research unit of the University of California until joining the NRS in 2012.

WMRC is unique among the UC reserves in the extent and organization of its historical materials. It is home to an indexed collection of documents reaching back to its early days as a US Navy research facility. These materials are held at the Owens Valley Laboratory, located 3 miles from Bishop. The reserve also maintains a bibliography of research publications, several long-term datasets, and a map collection. Some of these materials are available in digital form on the WMRC website.

Although the materials at this site pertain to many topics, they are of particular interest to historical ecologists interested in long-term climate and ecological change, and historians of science who wish to learn more about the station’s key roles in the histories of cosmology, physiology, dendrochronology, and other subjects.