It had wide, landscaped streets lined with over four hundred homes, some with as many as four bedrooms. As the mine expanded, Eagle Mountain grew to a peak population of 4000. Eagle Mountain is accessible by Kaiser Road ( Riverside County Route R2) from California State Route 177, twelve miles (19 km) north of Desert Center, midway between Indio and the California/Arizona state line along Interstate 10.įounded in 1948 by Kaiser Steel Corporation, Eagle Mountain is located at the entrance of the now-defunct Eagle Mountain iron mine. The town's fully integrated medical care system, similar to other Kaiser operations in California, was the genesis of the modern-day Kaiser Permanente health maintenance organization. The town is located at the entrance of the now-defunct Eagle Mountain iron mine, once owned by the Southern Pacific Railroad, then Kaiser Steel, and located on the southeastern corner of Joshua Tree National Park. Eagle Mountain is a ghost town in the California desert in Riverside County founded in 1948 by industrialist Henry J.