Keeler in the 1870s was a thriving town with 7,000 inhabitants.
It was a port for the steamship carrying silver bullions across the then deep blue Ownes lake to Cartago from the Cerro Gordo Mine. At Cartago the bullions were then taken on a 20 mules team to Los Angeles helping build the city we know.
In the 1900s the already booming city of Los Angeles began acquiring water rights and starting in the 1913 it diverted the streams feeding the lake into a new aqueduct.
As a result the lake slowly but inexorably began to dry and die.
And so did Keeler.
The surface of the now dry lake is an immense wet salt flat containing a variety of minerals including sulfates, halite, mirabilite, thenardite and trona. With the right conditions halophilic bacteria proliferate coloring the lake in bright pink.
Owens valley has always been notorious for its winds and these winds blow the alkaline dust with all its toxic components from the dry lake bed causing grave respiratory problems to the few inhabitants along with higher occurrences of lung cancer, making it hard to justify staying in Keeler. According to the 2010 Census the population is 66.
The Owens Valley ranks as the dustiest place in North America, second in the world only to the Aral Sea