Temple Hills and Mystic Hills, Laguna Beach

Artist's concept of Temple Hills, 1924

Charles Upton asks: "What is the history between 'Mystic Hills' and 'Temple Hills' in Laguna Beach? And might you have any history specifically on the 'Mystic Hills' timeline?”

Well, after a little digging, I do now, Charles! Thanks for asking. Here's what I found out:

TEMPLE HILLS - Laguna Beach pioneer and real estate speculator Joseph S. "Joe" Thurston bought some hilltop land that had belonged to George Rogers. Thurston dubbed it "Temple Hills" and by 1924 was trying to sell parcels there for residential use. But Thurston faced financial problems. In 1927 Clifton J. Platt of Pasadena took over the development process and subdivision maps were filed. Platt made Volney B. Cox (who developed Beverly Hills) manager of the project.

"Temple Hills" sign visible in this view looking inland from Heisler Park, across the Victor Hugo Inn's parking lot and Coast Highway, circa 1940.

In his 1947 book, Laguna Beach of Early Days, Thurston wrote about Temple Hills: "The hills have always had a fascination for me. I enjoy walking over their sloping, graceful contours, the hills that I have been so familiar with ever since I was a small child. Everyone would wander in the hills seeking inspiration, and get acquainted with them, while they are furnishing physical as well as spiritual strength. They are the temples of creation and it would be a drab country if we did not have the hills. Some years later, the question arose as to what we should call them, and in casting around for a name it was finally decided that they should be called TEMPLE HILLS.”

However, the name may actually predate Thurston's real estate aspirations. Historian Don Meadows writes, "During the early days of the art colony the [entire] range of hills behind Laguna Beach was called Temple Hills. Later the name was applied to a subdivision on the same locality."

As for lots in Mystic Hills, Los Angeles Times, 3-20-1960

MYSTIC HILLS - While some homes in the Mystic Hills area – high above Laguna's Main Beach – were built as early as the 1920s, the name Mystic Hills didn’t begin appearing in real estate advertising until June 1959. The development's wide roads and utilities marked the start of Coast Realty Co.'s development of the Mystic Hills Estate subdivision. The building boom at Mystic Hills extended well into the 1960s. Newspaper ads promoted "Ocean view lots. Wide avenues. Model homes open for inspection. Free membership to Laguna Beach Country Club."

I don't know why or specifically by whom the real estate marketing name "Mystic Hills" was selected for this neighborhood. But it does have an artsy ring to it that works well with the "artists' colony" image that Laguna retained long after most artists were priced out of the market. 

Mystic Hills was one of the worst-hit neighborhoods during the big Laguna Beach Fire of 1993. Between 199 and 286 homes (depending on which reports you read) burned down in Mystic Hills, partly due to inadequate water pressure in the area. These suddenly-vacant lots launched a second major building boom there in the months and years that followed.

José Andrés Sepúlveda’s El Refugio

Portrait of Don José Andrés Sepúlveda, circa 1856 by Henri Joseph Penelon (Courtesy Bowers Museum, via Santa Ana Public Library)

A tiny sketch of an adobe ruin in western Santa Ana, labeled “Refugio,” appears on the 1936 pictorial map of "Orange County Adobes, Old Roads, Trails, Ranchos & Springs," created by Gladyce E. Ashby and Fred C.Groos as part of Works Progress Administration (WPA) project 3105. This adobe belonged to Don José Andrés Sepúlveda (1803-1875) and was one of the best known and earliest homes between Los Angeles and San Diego. Despite its significance, this historic site hasn’t garnered much attention in the last few generations and until now its exact location has long been unclear. 

Detail of WPA wall map. El Refugio at upper right.

The initial portion of the adobe was built by José Antonio Yorba II. He had inherited the land from his father, who died in died 1825. It’s likely the house was built sometime after his father's amended will was finalized in 1830.

The Orange County California Genealogical Society’s book, Saddleback Ancestors, describes Jose Antonio Yorba II initially building a home called Santa Ana Abajo near the Santa Ana River. “Its comfortable rooms provided adequate accommodations for Jose and his wife, Josefa Verdugo, all the little Yorbas, and the many cousins and travelers stopping by to visit. Later however, Jose II needed still more space and built another house… at the edge of his property in the southwest part of the future city of Santa Ana.”

This second adobe is what would later become known as El Refugio. Saddleback Ancestors goes on to describe the new house’s accommodations: “The sleeping quarters offered to visitors were always the pride and joy of the señora of this hospitable ranch. Usually the beds had snowy white counterpanes and lace-trimmed pillows, and everything about the bedroom was immaculately clean. The couch beneath this finery was simple, just dried bullock’s hide stretched on a rough frame of wood. It was a characteristic of the Californians that the chief expense of the household of even the poorer families was lavished on the bed though the other furniture may have been meager.”

In 1854, Jose Antonio Yorba II’s son, Domingo de la Resurreccion Yorba, sold 1, 400 acres of the Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana – including the second adobe – to Rancho San Joaquin owner José Antonio Andrés Sepúlveda for the cost of  $6,000 plus a hundred heifers, fifty steers, and fifty fillies.

José Andrés Sepúlveda, circa 1860s (Courtesy Seaver Center via Anaheim Heritage Center)

“Perhaps better than his contemporaries, José Antonio Andrés Sepúlveda, with his vast landholdings, reckless wagers, prodigal hospitality and fancy costumes, epitomized those qualities from which the myth of romantic California was eventually fashioned,“ wrote California historian Sr. Mary Joanne Wittenburg, SND. Sepúlveda had been granted the massive San Joaquin (which later became the main portion of the Irvine Ranch) in 1842. 

Once also in possession of the Yorba adobes, Sepúlveda expanded the larger one significantly, named it El Refugio (The Refuge), and moved in. At the time, he was at the apex of his life. The Gold Rush (bringing countless hungry mouths to feed) had driven beef prices into the stratosphere and money flowed like water for cattlemen. Sepulveda owned about 102,000 acres, about 12,000 head of cattle and about 3,000 horses.  

Namesake of El Refugio. (Courtesy Bowers Museum)

El Refugio took its name from a black and white lithograph of Nuestra Senora del Refugio or ‘Our Lady of Refuge,’ which hung in a gilt frame inside the family’s home chapel. Along with other artifacts from El Refugio, this lithograph was later on display at Bowers Museum. Georgie van der Leck, Sepulveda’s granddaughter loaned a large number of artifacts to Bowers in 1936, 1946 and 1952. Many of these items were returned to the family (specifically to Viola van der Leck Lantz) in 1968, but some items, including the lithograph, still remain with the museum.

Pitcher with inner chamber for ice. From El Refugio. (Courtesy Bowers Museum)

The “Adobes of Orange County” survey by C.E. Roberts (part of the same WPA project as the aforementioned map) calls El Refugio the best known of the five adobes in the "Santa Ana Group," which also included the A.T. Bates and Julian Chaves adobes. Roberts writes,…

"Old timers recall that the adobe buildings were quite extensive and in the shape of an L; that there were great corrals to the southeast and that there was a famous spring to the west. Tony Yorba, son of Domingo, says that his father built the row of rooms running east to west and that Sepúlveda added the long L running to the south. …This adobe has achieved fame partly by its unusual dimensions and mostly from its association with the hospitable and wealthy Don José Sepúlveda. Here [Los Angeles] Sheriff [James R.] Barton and his men [stopped and] breakfasted before they were killed by the bandit [Juan] Flores, and here were celebrated many a christening, wedding and rodeo feast with a gathering of the powerful Sepúlveda clan.”

Martina Espinosa, a.k.a. La Chola Martina, in later years (Courtesy Huntington Library)

Indeed, early folklore (by which we mean bunk) also holds that Juan Flores’ supposed San Juan Capistrano sweetheart, Martina Espinoza Burruel, (who in wackier versions is also a brujah/witch) tampered with the guns of Barton and his men at El Refugio that morning in 1857, thus helping seal their fate when ambushed later that day. (More likely true is the tale that Sepulveda warned Barton not to continue on with such a small posse.)

And while El Refugio often served as a country manor in which to entertain guests, historian Jim Sleeper points out that it was not likely a spot for roundups being so far from Sepúlveda’s main cattle operations. 

In an article for the May 28, 1936 Santa Ana Journal, historian Terry E. Stephenson wrote, “A favorite sport at El Refugio was the bear and bull fight. There was nothing tame about these fights, as described by J. E. 'Judge' Pleasants, who while living in the Santiago Canyon in the ‘60s was often a  guest at the Sepúlveda home. He often aided the Sepúlveda young men and their vaqueros in roping a grizzly in the Santiago hills, to be carted to El Refugio and there to be held for the fight with a wild bull.”

Like most Rancho adobe homes, El Refugio had a cluster of other adobes around it which housed ranch hands and served various industrial purposes. It has been suggested that a number of these smaller buildings (not just the first Yorba adobe here) may have predated El Refugio.

In a document provided to the Bowers Museum, Georgie van der Leck stated that the main El Refugio adobe had twenty-two rooms.

Pioneer Edgar P. Stafford shared his own boyhood memories of El Refugio in the Orange County Historical Society’s third History Series volume: “The main living room was on the north. There was an annex extending to the south which was used first for help and then as a storeroom and a harness and saddle room, and last a room for horses.”

Stafford also recalled using an adjacent spring as a swimming hole. He describes the spring as seemingly bottomless and located “one hundred yards or so south of West First Street, near Daisy Street. Mexicans in earlier days had put up a dirt wall around the spring . It was surrounded by creek willows.”

El Refugio was also where Sepulveda’s fabled race horse, Black Swan, went to retire. However, the horse only lived for about a year after that, dying of tetanus.

Detail from Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana 1868 partition map. El Refugio in upper left.(Courtesy Orange County Archives)

Sepúlveda continued to make El Refugio his residence as late as March 1871, when part of the house was destroyed by fire. By that point, he had sold the Rancho San Joaquin and put ownership of his Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana holdings into the hands of his daughter, Ascension Sepuveda de Mott. She, in turn, sold the property to Captain John West in December 1874. The part of the house that survived the fire was leveled around 1876, but the site was still easily identifiable well into the 1880s.

Sepulveda Tract map, 1874 (Los Angeles County)

So where in western Santa Ana was El Refugio located? Most attempts at identifying the exact spot have come in the form of vague maps or interviews with (or articles by) early residents that are subject to the haziness of their distant memory. Almost all evidence points to it having been somewhere along a quarter-mile stretch of what’s now S. Raitt St. Pinpointing exactly where is trickier.

Some recent sources indicate the adobe was roughly 1/2 to 3/4 of a mile south of First St, and about the same distance west of Bristol Ave. Similarly, Stafford recalled it being “about a quarter of a mile east of Bristol Street and about the same distance south of First Street.”

1947 aerial view of Artesia St. (Courtesty Orange County Archives)

In a July 1969 article for the Pacific Coast Archeaologial Society's PCAS Quarterly, historian Jim Sleeper placed the site of El Refugio at another nearby location: the southeast corner of today’s First Street and Sullivan St. Among his sources, Sleeper cites the 1868 partition map of the Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana, which shows Sepúlveda’s house and corrals. On the 1868 map, he makes particular note of a “belt of sycamores” extending across the rancho and ending at El Refugio. Also, “immediately east of Sepúlveda’s place was a road which passed northward to Los Angeles and southward to the house of Cogate (?) Sepúlveda (near Bristol and Edinger). Henceforth meandering southeast, the path was labeled ‘Road to San Joaquin.’ A second trail intersected a quarter mile below Refugio, its northeasterly extension being the ‘Road to Santa Ana’ (Abajo), near the present West Chapman Bridge in Orange. … The southwesterly leg ran to the estancia in Costa Mesa, by now called the Diego Sepúlveda house.”

Sleeper is known for his meticulous research, so it’s surprising to find that a close comparison of the 1868 partition map and a modern USGS topographical map actually (mis)places El Refugio right around 120 S. Raitt St., near the intersection of W. Walnut St. 

West Santa Ana map from 1936 WPA report on Orange County adobes.

C. E. Roberts’ 1936 WPA adobe report offers a third possibility, less than a quarter mile away, that seems the most promising of all. Roberts refers to a map of the Sepulveda Tract filed with the County of Los Angeles in 1874 (which was likely copied from an even earlier map), which shows that El Refugio “was situated at the southern end of Artesia Street.” Today, Artesia is Raitt Street and has been extended significantly. 

Judge Pleasants second wife, historian Adelina Pleasants, echoed Roberts’ assessment when she recalled El Refugio in the March 11, 1937 edition of the Santa Ana Register as being “a short distance east of the south end of Artesia Street. …Mortimer Hubbard of Tustin assisted in levelling the old adobe wall and is [the] authority on the exact location.” 

1938 aerial view of Artesia St. (Courtesty Orange County Archives)

Likewise, in an article about ranchos in the Nov 22, 1939 Santa Ana Register, Stephenson wrote, "Don José Sepúlveda… eventually built his adobe ranch house at a point near the south end of South Artesia street in Santa Ana today." 

In a September 25,1928 Santa Ana Register article, pioneer dairyman J. T. Raitt described details of the land west of Santa Ana as it appeared upon his arrival in the late 1880s: "One fourth mile south of First Street and just west of Artesia street there was an old spring known as the Sepulveda spring. In the early days this was the source of the water supply for large herds of cattle, especially in the dry season, and as late as 1905 this spring was still running. Before that time in an endeavor to stop the flow of the spring a dyke six feet high was built up around it but proved unsuccessful in stopping this flow." That spring is shown of the 1874 Sepulveda Tract map, with a large adobe immediately to the east of it. Combined with J. T. Raitt's description, this would again put the adobe approximately at the northeast corner of Raitt St. and Myrtle St.

Pre-1889 map showing adobes and the confluence of the Santa Ana River and Santiago Creek. (Filed with County of Los Angeles. Copy from Orange County Archives.)

There’s also an undated map (recorded prior to 1889 in Los Angeles County's Deeds, Book A, pages 1105 and 1106) that looks like it might have been traced from an earlier Mexican-Era map but with markings added in English. It shows the corrals north (not southeast) of the adobe and refers to the complex as “Indian Ranchero,” but it seems to basically match Roberts’, Pleasants’ and Raitt’s observations. These sources, taken in combination, put the main adobe’s location about ¼ mile south of 1st St. and ¼ mile west of Bristol at what’s now the northeast corner of Raitt and Myrtle St. The two adjoining lots at this location today are 415 and 423 S. Raitt St. They are both currently vacant and owned by the City of Santa Ana. 

Intersection of Raitt and Myrtle Streets, Santa Ana, 2018. Note vacant lots. (Photo by author)

In February 2020, the City was awarded a $1.6 million state grant to develop a 1.9-acre park on these lots over the next two years. Initial park plans called for a "a skate area, exercise area, tot lot, butterfly interpretive garden, walking loop, open space and restroom. The project additionally include[d] drought tolerant landscaping, a river-rock bio swale and a picnic area."

Initial plan for park at El Refugio site. (Courtesy City of Santa Ana)

In May 2020, Manny Escamilla, a local historian and former planner with the City, wrote to the mayor and city council about the naming of this park: “I've attached the relevant research and background provided by Chris [Jepsen] to be included in the public record… If at all possible I believe that the park should be named in honor of the El Refugio adobe, ...[and] that the final design incorporate a historical marker if possible within the existing funding level, or provide a space in which a future marker may be placed pending additional funding."

The City agreed, and plans are moving forward for a new “El Refugio Park” at the site. Considering the importance of the site, one would assume that appropriate archeological oversight will be provided during the grading process. One can only imagine what remnants of the Rancho Era that may be uncovered in the process.

The closest thing to a historical marker so far, located up Raitt St. from El Refugio at Walnut St. (Photo by author)

[For more about Sepulveda, see Jim Sleeper’s, “The Many Mansions of Jose Sepulveda,” in Pacific Coast Archeological Society Quarterly, Vol. 5, No. 3, July 1969. For more about the practice of fiestas and bear/bull fights at El Refugio, see Terry E. Stephenson’s classic, Shadows of Old Saddleback. Thanks to historian Eric Plunkett and to Katie Hess of the Bowers Museum for their contributions to this article and to Joel Robinson for catching an error (now corrected). Several pertinent research institutions were closed to the public for COVID-19 lockdowns while I was working on this article. If more information becomes available to me after things reopen, I will update this post with whatever else I've learned on the subject.]

Truer words,...

 "You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them." -Ray Bradbury

Citrus in Orange County

This citrus crate label from Tustin depicts orange groves and the Santa Ana Mountains.

I recently ran across a CD full of short historical items written by my late friend and mentor, historian Phil Brigandi. Since I don't see this content elsewhere online or in print, I'm going to start posting a few of these pieces (credited, of course) on my blog from time to time. I'm glad to get a bit more of Phil's work out in the world. And it comes at an especially good time, since assorted projects and challenges have kept me from writing as many blog posts as I'd like lately. With that said,... Here's a brief introduction to Orange County's citrus roots by the man who could have (and should have) written a whole book on the subject:

The Citrus Industry in Orange County

by Phil Brigandi

For many years, oranges and Orange County were synonymous. While never our only crop, oranges dominated local agriculture from the 1890s to the 1950s.

Dr. W.N. Hardin of Anaheim is usually credited with planting the first local orange trees in 1870. A number of different varieties were tried in the 19th Century, and while Navel Oranges were popular in the early days, the Valencia Orange eventually came to dominate the area. Navels ripen in the winter, while Valencias are harvested from May to November. The first commercial Valencia grove here was planted in 1875 on what is now the site of California State University Fullerton. 

The market for local citrus crops was limited until good railroad connections and refrigerated cars became available. A blight that swept the local vineyards in the late 1880s prompted other ranchers to switch from grapes to citrus. By 1915, there were already over 20,000 acres of orange groves here, and by 1936 Orange County was producing one-sixth of the nation’s Valencia crop, which generated two-thirds of the county’s agricultural income. 

Citrus pickers on the Hewes Ranch, in the El Modena area of Orange.

Lemons, limes, grapefruit, and other varieties of citrus fruit were also grown here. Grapefruit and limes were never very successful, but lemons did well in some areas. During the 1930s and ‘40s, there were about 8,000 acres of lemon groves in the county, and a few packing houses were devoted entirely to lemons, including the Central Lemon Association in Villa Park.

Originally, each individual grower had to pick, pack, ship, and market their own crop, or sell it at reduced rates through commission agents representing large wholesalers. In the 1880s and ‘90s, growers began joining together to form cooperative packing and marketing associations to better control the industry. By the 1930s, there were more than 40 local packing houses stretching from one end of the county to the other. In just the area in and around Orange, there were eleven packing houses, including the Santiago Orange Growers Association, one of the busiest orange packing houses in the state.

Most of the local packing houses were members of the Southern California Fruit Exchange (better known by their trademark, Sunkist). Others belonged to the Mutual Orange Distributors (MOD) or other smaller organizations. Sunkist, and the other regional organizations, sponsored major advertising campaigns across the United States in the early 20th Century that helped to transform oranges and orange juice from a holiday treat to an everyday item.

Brightly colored citrus labels were part of the promotional campaign. Each packing house used several different labels to indicate the various grades of fruit. Their bright colors, distinctive designs, and large lettering made it easy for wholesale buyers to spot them at auction sales. 

Packing oranges in the Yorba Linda Citrus Packing House, circa 1949.

Oranges are susceptible to a number of insect pests and diseases, which growers had to fight in a variety of ways, including fumigation with hydrocyanic acid. Freezing temperature is another danger. On cold nights, oil was burned in “smudge pots” to keep the fruit from freezing. In later years, some growers used large fans to circulate the air and protect their groves.

But the worst citrus disease was the Quick Decline, a virus that began to infect local groves in the 1940s and killed off trees by the thousands. Orange County’s rapid growth in the 1950s and ‘60s added other challenges for local growers, including the rising costs of land, water, and taxes. More and more groves were pulled out to make way for subdivisions. 

Citrus acreage in Orange County reached its peak in 1948, with 67,263 acres in Valencias alone – more than five million trees. As of 2004, less than 100 acres of citrus were still being harvested here. Villa Park Orchards Association, the last remaining packing house in Orange County, is slated to move their operations to Ventura County in the near future. Orange County’s citrus industry will soon be just a memory.

[The Villa Park Orchards packing house, located in the Cypress Barrio of Orange, has indeed closed down since this article was written. But the building is being preserved and adapted for other uses by Chapman University. - Ed]

Another cautionary tale...

We recently lost Prof. Walter E. Williams, who, like any great economist, had an excellent grasp of the patterns, details and mechanics of history:

"A tyrant's first battlefield is to rewrite history. Most notable were the political purges of Joseph Stalin. The Soviet government erased figures from Soviet history by renaming cities – such as the Imperial capital of St. Petersburg to Petrograd and Leningrad and Stalingrad – and eradicating memories of czarist rule. Stalin's historical revisions also included changing photographs and history books, thereby distorting children's learning within educational establishments.

"...Most of the effort to rewrite American history has its roots among the intellectual elite on our college campuses whose message has been sold to predominantly white college students who have little understanding of how they are being used."

-Walter E. Williams (1936-2020)

Rob Richardson in railroad heaven

Tim Rush just sent me an email I felt I had to share, since so many of you knew (and therefore liked) railfan, local historian, and Santa Ana booster Rob Richardson. Although Rob passed away in July 2020, his family -- with help from Tim -- took him on one last adventure that I know he would have greatly appreciated. I'll let Tim tell the story,...

"As many of you know among Rob’s final wishes was to have some of his remains scattered about the train tracks at the Cajon Pass where he loved to go and observe the huge trains come and go along the mountain pass.    This past Saturday Bella and the three youngest of the children, Cameron, Ian and Lia and I left my house after a suitable snack of donuts and chocolate milk at 6:45 a.m. for The Cajon Pass.  We went to a spot that had been recommended by several folks 'in the know' about where to do this.  Along the way we stopped at Rob’s favorite fast food spot, Del Taco for breakfast then we were off to Cleghorn Road tracks.  We parked and the family went down to the tracks.   I stayed with our rented Jeep Wrangler (Bella was certain we would need a four wheel drive vehicle, and she was so correct) to look out for Railroad Police.    

"Along came a train 'foamer' to watch and he was  about 25’ ahead of us.    Bella took the initiative to ask him about a spot she and Rob used to go to “a hill with a couple of trees and benches, a promontory that you can watch all three tracks with trains coming and going….”  As serendipity would have it this fellow knew exactly where she was talking about.   That morning on the drive up she for the first time mentioned this spot and I thought, 'our chance of finding that out in the middle of BFE was about zero' but I kept my thoughts to myself.   Much to my surprise this fellow led us right to the entrance.  We had a rollicking, Mr. Toad’s wild ride up to the summit of what we discovered is known in the train fanatic world as Hill 582*.  It even shows up on Google Maps……..Cameron found it.  After you have white knuckled up the mountain, and you are seated on one of the benches one can sense why it was a favored spot for Rob to visit several times a year.   Bella said he nearly always went on his birthday.  To see those massive trains 125-150 cars long plus 3-4 engines traversing that grade (a 3% grade, quite steep in the train world) is a marvel of modern machinery.   We were told by a retired trainman who arrived after us on Hill 582 that the train cannot exceed 20MPH going down the grade or they will lose control and likely crash.   And in the train world 20MPH means no more, zero tolerance, an Engineer will lose his job at 21MPH.

(*Retired Trainmen/women and train lovers have donated tens of thousands of hours creating this viewing spot, with landscaping, benches, a couple of eucalyptus trees and a reasonably maintained road.  They truck 480 gallons of water up there each week to slake the thirst of the vegetation as it only gets 4-5” of rain a year.  It is quite the little oasis and a testimonial to the love of train fans and all things trains.)

"We wrote our names in the journal that is there for visitors to sign……..watched some trains, buried more of his remains, said a prayer and enjoyed the view. It was a bit nippy, at 39 degrees with the wind blowing, we were above the fog that was like pea soup going up the I-15.  We stopped at Cabella’s Outdoor World ………they had never been there and arrived back in SNA at 12;30pm.  Rob’s remains have been placed at the SNA Train Station (our secret), Cajon Pass (two spots) and we will make a trek to Tehachapi soon and our work will be done.

"In case you are wondering about the school naming issue for Rob…….it is a slow process filled with much political intrigue.  Not quite at the Agatha Christie level……..but for Santa Ana it is our version.   I will keep you all posted. By the way, the City is in process of having  a new bronze memorial plaque with much more detail created to recognize Rob at the receiving platform at SNA Train Station.  You may recall it was dedicated to Rob in 1999. Every time  I hear a train whistle I think of Rob, or see a train on a TV show……….he lives on in our memories of this remarkable human being. As Jane Russo opined at his memorial service, 'his heart didn’t give out, he gave US his heart.'"

UPDATE: I received the following follow-up email from Tim on Christmas Eve:

“…Last week I shared [that] we planned to visit Tehachapi to make a deposit of our friend RR.  No great surprise that a little town that for years was known as “Old Town,” founded by the Southern Pacific Railroad in the 1860s, would be a draw for our friend Rob. Bella (Rob’s widow and three of the four children, Cameron, Ian and Lia) and I trundled off to the Tehachapi Valley this past Saturday at 0700.   Everyone promptly fell asleep and I was travelling the 2.5 hours to this historic town that is State Historic Landmark No. 673. …Our first stop was Rob’s favorite, Kohnen’s German Bakery. We gorged ourselves on all manner of sweet treats and then had to order sandwiches for lunch of course.   When you make your way up here, this place is absolutely a destination.  The food is terrific and right next to the Railroad Museum and Depot, and tracks…how perfect is that? 

Of course, everything except for the fact that so many of the attractions were closed due to COVID.  We could peek into the windows of the Tehachapi RR Museum and Depot (rebuilt in 2008 due to a fire that burned the original one to the ground).  They have a “signal garden” next to the Depot.  It has a cool collection of old, retired RR signals and equipment which is rather unique.   Their downtown has quite a number of shops and places to spend your dollars.

Tehachapi Depot (Photo courtesy Bella Richardson)

“Whilst we visited the depot……we wandered out to the tracks and made a deposit of Rob’s ashes…just like Cajon Pass the wind was blowing and it was cold, but very clear.   A perfect day for train watching.   This place gets lots of action, seemed there was a train coming thru about every thirty minutes.

“My nephew and his wife and family live in Tehachapi, he is a plumbing contractor, and she runs a second hand shop.   Knowing how Rob loved to paw thru old crap……we of course stopped and purchased a number of items that we couldn’t live without.  In memory of Rob of course!  We finally loaded back into my car and headed for The Golden City. I had suggested to Bella and the kids that we stop for a tour of the Tehachapi State Prison, but they felt we were tight on time………so perhaps next visit.

“All in all it was a fun outing, and gave us an opportunity to honor our friend and his deep love of trains.”

San Clemente -- another of Rob's favorite spots -- was also on the agenda. (Photo by Bella Richardson)

A year without Phil

One year ago today, on Dec. 12, 2019, historian Phil Brigandi passed away in his beloved hometown or Orange. His last breath was taken only a stone’s throw from the very spot where, sixty years earlier, he took his first breath --  a fact Phil would no doubt have appreciated. He would have a clever way of phrasing it, which all his friends would have heard several times by now. 

He was my mentor, friend and colleague. The article I wrote immediately upon learning of Phil’s death, and my follow-up article about his time as our County Archivist, captured most of what I wanted to say about him at the time, and I won’t rehash it all here. Today's post is more of mile marker.

Once the innumerable public and private tributes to Phil finally started to wind down, we all found ourselves faced with COVID-19. But before and during various stages of lockdown, much has been accomplished to keep Phil’s work and memory alive. A few examples follow:

1) Phil’s last book, a new edition of his history of Scouting in Orange County, On My Honor, was published.

2) Phil’s vast historical files – per his wishes – were given to the Sherman Library in Corona del Mar, where (once processed) they will be available as an invaluable research source for current and future generations of historians.

3) A good share of Phil’s massive historical library (separate of his papers) and other historical materials went to the publicly accessible Orange County Archives.

4) Another large portion of Phil’s personal library went to the newly-dubbed Phil Brigandi History Room at the Orange County Historical Society. OCHS also established a Phil Brigandi Fund to help with this project. In the months before his death, Phil did a tremendous amount of work to assist OCHS in getting their collections whipped into shape and easily accessible to the public. 

5) Stephanie George rescued Phil’s website (www.ochistoryland.com) and kept it operating this year. Starting in January, the Orange County Historical Society will take over maintenance.

6) Knowing that the local Boy Scout Council has no interest in having a museum or archives of their own, Phil’s extensive collection of scouting materials went to some of his scouting friends, in whom he had instilled a strong interest in the history of the Boy Scouts in Orange County. Thanks to David Daniels ome of that material has also been sold off to collectors raise money for the Phil Brigandi Campership Fund for scouts.

7) Phil’s collection of Ramona/Helen Hunt Jackson material went to his friend, Dydia Delyser, who’s the only other historian doing serious work on the Ramona myth.

8) COVID-19 lockdowns provided a perfect opportunity to share Phil’s work with new audiences (who suddently had a little time on their hands). I’ve been regularly posting links to his articles in the Orange County History group on Facebook. 

9) Remaining local historians are closer knit in the wake of our loss and are working (jointly and severally) to do our best to fill in some of the tasks Phil would have handled in the past. Some stepped up to lecture more often; others write and edit what Phil cannot; and historical society volunteers have stepped up their game—hauling, organizing, and doing whatever needs to be done. It’s a LITTLE weird to answer questions from the press that would have been directed at Phil a year ago. But it’s a LOT weird to answer questions on topics like the history of Orange – topics none of us ever bothered with until now because Phil had them down cold. 

In reference to Phil’s papers and library, I suppose it seems weird to outline the distribution of someone’s estate in a blog post. But Phil would have wanted local historians to know where all his great stuff went, so they could access it and learn from it in the future. He was a sharer, never a hoarder.

The local historical community will never be the same without Phil, but it’s dramatically better off for all the knowledge, energy and friendship he shared with us. 

Connections between Calico and Orange County

Phil Brigandi in Calico, 2009. (Photo by C. Jepsen)

When the Orange County Historical Society held a historical of the mining town of Calico (near Yermo) in March 2014, Phil Brigandi told us historical tales on the bus trip out. I just stumbled across some of his notes from that day, and thought I'd share them here...

A FEW CALICO-ORANGE COUNTY CONNECTIONS

By Phil Brigandi

Margaret Kincaid Olivier was the last schoolteacher at Calico, for the 1898-99 term. Her husband [Remi T. Olivier] and her brother James Kincaid operated a store at Calico in the early 1880s. It was said that in later years she taught private pupils in English and Spanish in Huntington Beach, which was where she passed away in 1932. She was buried at the Calico Cemetery alongside her husband and oldest son.

Walter Knott in Calico, circa 1960.

Walter Knott, son of Elgin Knott and Virginia Dougherty, explored Calico during the time he was homesteading (1915-1917) in Newberry Springs (about 20 miles to the southeast). He purchased the townsite of Calico and seventy-five surrounding acres in 1951 from the Zenda Gold Mining Co. and donated it a little over ten years later to the County of San Bernardino. Knott had grown up hearing stories of Calico 's mining days from his uncle, John C. King who had married [Walter’s] mother's older sister, Martha. King had been Sheriff of San Bernardino County from 1879 until 1882, and he had invested in the Silver King Mine as well as a hotel at Calico.

David M. Harwood was listed as a farmer and fruit grower in Orange County in 1880 Census. His wife (Elizabeth French Harwood) had written letters about her experiences including living at Calico, which had been published in the Santa Ana Standard in 1882. Harwood owned more than one mine in the district in the early 1880s, and news of his progress with it was published in the Anaheim Gazette. Their daughter Rose or Rosabell married a man who had been a miner at Calico.

Calico Schoolhouse in 1885. (Courtesy O.C. Archives)

Richard F. Stanton had been a barber at Calico in the late 1890s and his children attended the Calico School. The family moved to Barstow, and then lived in Fullerton from about 1910-1920. He died in 1921 and his wife Emma in 1947, and they were both buried at Loma Vista Memorial Park in Fullerton (where Walter Knott was also buried). 

Halsey Dunning had been a miner at Calico in the 1880s. He and his second wife had twins at Calico in 1889. His daughter from his previous marriage named Aurelia married Osgood Catland, and they raised their family in Santa Ana, Orange County.

Artist Paul von Kleiben, who designed Knott's Berry Farm's Ghost Town, also designed much of the "restoration" of Calico, as seen in this sketch from 1951.

Samuel L. King (no relation to John C. King) was reportedly a miner at Calico, who had died there in 1882. His remains were moved to a cemetery in Norwalk or Downey, and from there they were moved to Fairhaven Cemetery in Santa Ana.