Apple Valley Inn
The Apple Valley Inn was built to welcome people to the high desert, plain and simple. When Newton T. Bass opened the doors on Thanksgiving Day in 1948, the inn was meant to feel like a proper desert host—solid meals, clean rooms, a swimming pool out back, and a place where guests could sit down and feel looked after. For a young town still finding its footing, the inn became a place where business was done over dinner, and neighbors crossed paths without ceremony. Through the 1950s and 1960s, it served as Apple Valley’s front porch. Families came together for celebrations, travelers stopped in for a rest, and weekend guests arrived seeking sunshine and quiet. Entertainment and conversation were part of the draw, and the inn’s easygoing reputation reached well beyond the High Desert. Like many places of its era, its early welcome did not extend to everyone, a limitation later shed as the community matured. When Roy Rogers took over the inn in 1965, the place leaned fully into its western charm—horses, outdoor events, and a sense of fun that locals remember with affection. Though it closed in 1987, the inn remains a symbol of Apple Valley at its most open-hearted, when hospitality helped turn a stretch of desert into a community.
