Security Guard in Neenach, CA

The original name for present day Neenach is puyutsiwamǝŋ. This is in the Kitanemuk language. The Spanish referred to it as Ojo de la Vaca.

A 19th century name for the area was Cow Springs (34°46′22″N 118°37′17″W / 34.77273°N 118.62134°W), about a mile southwest of today’s Neenach School. El Camino Viejo, the Old Road to Los Angeles, passed from Laguna Chico Lopez north via Willow Springs Canyon, then west to the water at Aquaje Lodoso, then to Cow Springs and on to Tejon Pass. Later a shorter route was followed by the Stockton – Los Angeles Road and the Butterfield Overland Mail between Elizabeth Lake and Gorman. Instead of going north-south, travelers went east-west via the San Andreas Rift and Oakgrove Canyon, and north-south via Pine Canyon, Antelope Valley and Cow Springs. French Johns Station, 14 miles east of Gorman near Cow Springs, provided a way station for the stage line, teamsters and other travelers.

In 1888, Cow Springs was described as “a pleasant camping-place with willow trees, casting an inviting shade to the weary traveler” with a “pure, cold, limpid stream which came bubbling up from its earthen reservoir and went gaily dancing down to the thirsty soil that encompassed it about.”