Slab City - The Last Free Place

Situated near the south end of the Salton Sea and a few miles east of the small desert town of Niland, California is a fascinating settlement known as Slab City. I say place because, despite its name, Slab City is not a real city but a transient squatter settlement whose population fluctuates between about 150 people during the hot desert summer to as many as 4000 residents during the mild winter months.

My first impression of Slab City was that we had stumbled into an old 1960s hippy commune still clinging to life. There were some crude structures along with some RVs and trailers. There were also a few people present.

Since it was November, which is generally when northerners start heading south for the winter I wouldn’t be surprised if the population started increasing in the coming weeks. Unlike people with second winter homes or condos in the sunbelt people spending the winter in Slab City came by either driving an RV, pulling a camper or with a tent in their backpack.

While the nation was still officially neutral and the American Public still strongly against getting involved in another foreign war (World War I was enough) it was clear early on to military leaders that we had to be prepared in the event that we were dragged into the war that was raging in Europe and the Far East prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

The Marine Corps decided they needed a place to train the artillery units connected to the Navy’s Pacific Fleet. One of the requirements was that the site be within range of aircraft flying from aircraft carriers operating off America's Pacific coast near the San Diego Naval Base. The other requirement was that the base also be located well away from civilian population centers which wanted neither the sound of exploding artillery shells nor the fear of such shells landing in their backyards. The nearby Colorado Desert on the east side of the Laguna Mountains separating San Diego from the desert was an ideal place for artillery practice.

On February 6, 1942 the State of California transferred to the Department of the Navy (the Marine Corps is a part of the U.S. Navy) 631.345 acres to be used by the Marines for artillery training. The site was named Camp Robert H. Dunlap in honor of former Marine Corps artillery officer Robert Dunlap (1879-1931) who rose to the rank of General following service in the Spanish American War, Philippine Insurrection, Boxer Rebellion in China, 1914 occupation of Veracruz during the Mexican Revolution and World War I. He died in 1931.

Like modern cities and other U.S. military installations, Camp Dunlap was laid out in an urban grid pattern with over 8 miles of paved roads. The camp included a swimming pool (a great amenity for those stationed in the desert), other recreation areas, a sewer system, sewage treatment system, 30 buildings and water treatment and distribution systems. Concrete slabs were constructed to provide a foundation for the Camp’s buildings which were built on top of the slabs.

Construction of Camp Dunlap was completed in record time with only 7 months elapsing between signing of the papers transferring the land to the Navy and the opening of Camp Dunlap as an active military base on October 15, 1942. During the following 3 years, until the end of the War in the Pacific Theater in 1945, over 185,000 troops were trained at Camp Dunlap before being sent on to fight the war in the Pacific.

Once the war ended training and other operations at Camp Dunlap were slowly wound down. Artillery training soon ceased and after 1949 only a skeleton crew remained to keep and eye on the Camp. The Navy eventually decided that there was no longer a need to keep Camp Dunlap open and in 1956 the entire camp was dismantled with only the slabs and a couple of sentry boxes remaining.

Realizing that a bunch of slabs sitting in the desert contributed nothing to national defense, the Department of Defense in 1961 decided to remove from its books the 161 plus acres that they still owned.

On October 6, 1961 representatives from the Department of Defense and the government of California met and signed papers transferring the land from the Federal Government to the State of California. It appears that no money changed hands as both sides seemed to agree that the land was basically worthless.

To the bureaucrats living in their air conditioned homes and enjoying the amenities of modern urban life the abandoned Marine camp was nothing more than a collection of no longer needed concrete slabs sitting in a desert wasteland. For the next few years the slabs sat idle in the sun and overlooked by everyone.

When left to themselves, individual humans can be very creative, especially when it comes to problem solving. Slab City’s rebirth as a home for travelers began when some workers from a chemical company temporarily assigned to a project in the vicinity of the nearby town of Niland discovered the slabs not far from the project site and decided they would be an ideal place to park their camp trailers.

It wasn't long before other travelers passing through the area, especially retirees in RVs looking for a warm spot to park for the winter, hippies looking for new places to live and other wanderers seeking a temporary spot to park or camp soon noticed the site with its slabs which made it an ideal place settle and camp for a while. Best of all it was a place with a warm winter climate and no rules or fees.

After California acquired the vacant land that had previously belonged to the Marine Corps they had no more use for it than the Marines. So they basically forgot about the collection of concrete slabs sitting abandoned in the vast desert that makes up Imperial County.

Since the area was both remote and worthless neither the government in Sacramento nor the county officials in El Centro some 40 miles to the south bothered to pay any attention to what was happening in the remote site we now call Slab City. However, wandering travelers continued to drift in and settle down. It wasn’t long before Slab City had a small year round population (about 150 today) and a winter population of about 4,000.

Slab City is famous for no rent, no property taxes and none of the rules and regulations associated with urban government mainly because Slab City has no government. Of course there is also no water authority providing running water, no sewage system, no trash collection, electricity, etc which are found in every other city in the nation.

Things like food, water, fuel for their vehicles, etc. are not available in Stab City which means that residents have to travel to nearby Niland, or one of the other nearby small towns or venture further to cities like Palm Springs or San Diego in order to purchase these things.

While probably not big spenders, a large portion of the winter residents do need to shop for essentials in the local area. Even small purchases by the 4,000 or so Slab City winter residents in a town like nearby Niland with a population of a little over 1,000 results a large amount of revenue for the merchants of Niland. Further, their spending includes sales taxes collected by the communities, county and state on their purchases. Since Slab City residents utilize few, if any, of the public services funded by the sales taxes this is a boon to public coffers. Given this, both public officials and local merchants are naturally reluctant to change the status of Slab City.

In addition to having to venture to nearby towns for food and other necessities, another problem is the lack of property rights. Being a squatter community no one owns the land they are living on and there are no police to keep an eye on what property one does own.

Those wishing to escape the 120 plus degree summer heat have to take their property with them. That is why much of the population consists of winter visitors living in RVs or trailers they pull behind their cars. Those who have taken over a broken down RV, trailer or old school bus are forced to stay year round or risk losing their home to someone else who drifts in while the owner is away for the summer.

There is one, currently very small, group of people who do pay - tourists seeking to spend a night or two in Slab City.

One enterprising resident recently came up with the idea of providing tourist accommodations via Airbnb.

A couple of years ago or so after settling in Slab City he acquired a couple of used RVs, fixed them up and started renting them out to tourists. As of this writing he appears to be still in business as I found him on the Airbnb website offering the two RVs for $30 each per night.

We arrived in Slab City in November which is a month when most of those who migrate south every winter are still home in the north looking forward to spending Thanksgiving and Christmas with their children and grandchildren. The big migration which will boost the population of Slab City from the 150 or so summer residents back up to its winter population of 4,000 people, hadn’t yet started.

While Slab City lacks most of the infrastructure that most modern day urban and rural dwellers have come to expect, it is a community whose migratory residents are not bothered by the lack of running water, sewers, police, paved roads, etc.

That being said, Slab City for the most part is not populated by hermits each living a single existence in their own little world. Some have come together to build a social hall that has internet access of sorts as well as a community library.

While neither of these conform to the building code or zoning standards of any locality in the United States they meet the needs of those who take advantage of their services. Nobody pays for these and those who appreciate them the most appear to be the same people who provide the help to keep them running.

We didn’t visit the community center but did visit the library.

As one would expect in Slab City there were no library cards, no due dates and no late return fees. It is open to all Slab City residents as well as people like us who are just passing through.

Like many libraries it has books, magazines and DVDs. When a person sees one or more books, magazines or DVDs they like they can take it - there is no check out and it is up to the borrower to decide if and when to return it. The borrower can also elect to keep the Item if they don’t feel like returning it.. People can also drop off books and other materials that they no longer want.

Given the large number of retirees who winter in Slab City and travel around the country in their RVs I presume that many of them do a lot of reading over the course of a year and the library is a great place to unload those books they have read and stock up on new ones at the same time.

While Slab City is not the type of place where my wife or I care to live, we did enjoy our visit to this fascinating place located literally in the middle of nowhere.

While Slab City attracts a somewhat diverse group of people they do share one thing in common and that is a desire to be left alone and not have to deal with the numerous rules and regulations imposed by municipalities and homeowners associations as well as the taxes and fees associated with such communities. Despite the lack of rules Slab City is not anarchy where everyone does as they please without regard for others. Instead, Slab City residents seem to follow the idea behind the old quote "your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins".

Despite the large winter population crime seems to be limited to occasional petty theft in which the perpetrators get shunned and pushed to leave the city.

In addition to the lack of taxes and fees along with the lack of burdensome laws and regulations residents are free to think and live their life as they please. However, in doing so it appears that residents also respect the right of their neighbors to think and live their lives as they please.