Rancho Camulos

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Rancho Camulos
(U.S. National Historic Landmark)
A view of Rancho Camulos from the northwest.
Location:	5164 East Telegraph Road, Piru, California
Coordinates:	34°24′20.34″N 118°45′24″W / 34.40565, -118.75667Coordinates: 34°24′20.34″N 118°45′24″W / 34.40565, -118.75667
Built/Founded:	1853
Architect:	unknown
Architectural style(s):	Spanish Colonial, Mission/Spanish Revival
Designated as NHL:	February 16, 2000[1]
Added to NRHP:	November 1, 1996[2]
NRHP Reference#:	96001137
Governing body:	Private

Rancho Camulos, just east of Piru, California, was the home of Californio Ygnacio del Valle, an alcalde of Los Angeles and member of the California State Assembly. The ranch was known as the "Home of Ramona" because the Californio lifestyle was the setting for Helen Hunt Jackson's popular 1884 novel Ramona, which was believed to have taken place at Camulos, giving it nationwide recognition and helping in "romanticizing of the mission and rancho era of California history."^[1]

The 1,800-acre (7 km²) working ranch is a prime example of an early California rancho in its original rural setting. It was the source of the first commercially grown oranges in what is now Ventura County,^[3] and is one of the few remaining citrus growers in Southern California.

State Route 126 bisects the property, with most of the main buildings are located south of the highway, and a few buildings on the north. The main adobe is one of the few extant Spanish Colonial buildings left in the state. Most of the other buildings are done in Mission Revival or Spanish Colonial Revival, both of which are derivatives of the former.

Rancho Camulos is designated a National Historic Landmark, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and is also a California Historical Landmark. Many of the buildings and grounds are open to the public as a museum of this period in California history.

Contents 1 History 2 Agricultural development 3 Ramona 4 Grounds 5 Historic designations 6 References 7 External links

[edit] History

Originally a Tataviam village named Kamulus (meaning "juniper"^[4]), the area was used by Mission San Fernando Rey de España for growing crops and as a grazing area for livestock as early as 1804. The population of this relatively isolated area (only traversed by the El Camino Real), as recorded by William Edward Petty Hartnell during his inspection of the mission, was 416 in 1839.^[5] It was included in the 48,612-acre (197 km²) Rancho San Francisco granted to Del Valle's father, Antonio del Valle, administrator of Mission San Fernando, by Governor Juan B. Alvarado on January 22, 1839, after the secularization of the missions.

After Antonio's death in 1841, Ygnacio inherited Rancho San Francisco, but this was challenged in court by his father's second wife. Nevertheless, he constructed a four-room adobe house and a corral at Camulos. By 1857, the land title dispute was settled, with Ygnacio getting the western portion and the remainder was split among Antonio's children and his second wife. He purchased back some of the other portions from his family as well as the neighboring Rancho Temescal to the north, and began livestock operations on the expanded area. However, Del Valle and his family did not live on the ranch initially, instead settling in house on what is now Olvera Street in Los Angeles. The Del Valle family did not move back to Camulos, which he had expanded, until 1861. During this time, the ranch was overseen by José Antonio Salazar, Ygnacio's majordomo.

In the 1860s, a drought forced Del Valle to sell off much of his land, but Camulos not only survived, but thrived.^[3] By the time of his death in 1880, the house had expanded to twenty rooms and the compound had become a self-sustaining ranch, complete with a brick winery, chapel, barn and workers' housing. Records indicate that in 1870 the ranch was largest vintner in the area.^[3] A stagecoach line opened in 1874 and in 1887, Southern Pacific ran a rail line past the ranch, including a depot at Camulos, ending the ranch's isolation.

In 1908, the Del Valle Company was incorporated by Ygnacio's children, but by 1924, the property was sold to August Rübel, a native of Zürich, Switzerland. Upon its sale, the Los Angeles Times lamented,

“

An era in the history of California closed yesterday. The Del Valles of Camulos bade farewell to the homestead where they have lived in successive generations since Antonio del Valle. It was the passing of the old regime. They are said to be the last of the old Spanish families who held in unbroken succession to the ancestral acres.[6]

”

Rübel continued operating the ranch in the same manner as the Del Valles, employing many of same workers. He had served in the American Field Service during World War I and when World War II broke out, he volunteered for active duty again. However, he died while serving in Tunisia in 1943. After his death, his wife Mary married a man named Edwin Burger, who was not as interested in maintaining the rancho. After Mary's death in 1968, Burger closed the ranch entirely, and the buildings and grounds were left untended for years. Rübel's heirs regained control of the property after the 1994 Northridge earthquake, which had damaged a number of buildings on the rancho.

The Rübel family restored commercial citrus production and set about repairing the earthquake damage. They successfully lobbied to have Camulos listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996. In 2000, it was further designated a National Historic Landmark.^[1][7] Although the main house was restored in 1996, funding was not available to restore the smaller buildings until 2006. As a result, restoration efforts are currently taking place with construction expected to finish in spring 2007.^[8] The rancho is on State Route 126, but little is visible from the highway. After the restoration, one of the buildings will be converted to a rest area.

[edit] Agricultural development

Del Valle acquired his first Valencia orange seedlings in 1857 from his friend William Wolfskill. The fruit from these trees was the first to be commercially grown in what is now Ventura County, although this was a relatively small scale because the crops had to be taken by wagon to Los Angeles. A Southern Pacific line opened in 1876 seventeen miles (27 km) to the east in Saugus, providing a more convenient form of transport.

However, the primary agricultural product from Rancho Camulos was wine. Ninety acres (360,000 m²) of vineyards were planted in the 1860s and Camulos wines and brandies were known throughout Los Angeles and Santa Barbara.^[5] In 1870, records indicate Camulos was largest of the four vintners in the San Buenaventura Township of Santa Barbara County, with 45 tons (40,900 kg) of grapes grown, making 6,000 US gallons (23,000 L) of wine and 800 US gallons (3,000 L) of brandy.^[5] In addition to oranges and grapes, the ranch produced almonds, walnuts, apricots, wheat, corn and barley. Rose petals grown at Camulos were shipped to Europe to make perfume.^[9]

Over the years, the vineyards were replaced by other fruits. Today, about 600 acres (2.4 km²) are under cultivation, most of it oranges, but lemons, grapefruit, and avocados are grown too. This makes Camulos a rare instance of a surviving citrus operation. During the years 1920–45, the citrus industry experienced a period of great growth, and, in contrast to the natural desert-like conditions of the area, images of "citrus belts" help cement the image of Southern California as an idyllic farmland in the nation's eye.^[10] After World War II, urban development eliminated much of the Southern California citrus production, with the notable exception of the Santa Clara River Valley.

[edit] Ramona

Ramona, published in 1884, was based in part of some of the experiences that Helen Hunt Jackson had had during her visit to Rancho Camulos in 1882. The book was extremely popular and inspired a great deal of tourism,^[4] which happened to coincide with the opening of Southern Pacific railroad lines in Southern California.^[11]

With all of the interest generated by the book, a number of communities declared that they were the setting for the novel in order to cash in on the boom, most notably Rancho Guajome in San Diego County, where Jackson had also visited prior to the book's publication.^[12] However, the location of the fictional Moreno Ranch, "midway in the valley [between lands] to the east and west, which had once belonged to the Missions of San Fernando and San Bonaventura [sic]"^[13] corresponds to the location of Rancho Camulos, and the physical description of some of the buildings on the fictional ranch accurately describe actual buildings at Camulos.^[11] Unfortunately, Jackson died in 1885, never having publicly disclosed what locations the book was based on. Historians today are unsure whether Moreno Ranch actually represented a real location.^[14]

Nevertheless, writers such as George Wharton James researched the various claims, and in 1909 wrote that Camulos was the "avowed and accepted home of the heroine."^[15] Charles Fletcher Lummis, a close friend of the Del Valles^[11] and who had fallen in love with the teenage Susanita del Valle,^[4] took photographs of the buildings and published them in his own book, Home of Ramona: Photographs of Camulos, the fine old Spanish Estate Described by Mrs. Helen Hunt Jackson as the Home of "Ramona".^[12]

Given the general belief that Camulos was indeed the original setting, D.W. Griffith shot portions of his 1910 silent film at the rancho, using the chapel, the adobe and patio, and the nearby mountains as backdrops. Paintings and photographs by noted artists such as Adam Clark Vroman, Henry Chapman Ford, and Alexander Harmer of the rancho also illustrated later versions of the novel.

Naturally, Rancho Camulos was a prime destination for Ramona aficionados. Southern Pacific's main Ventura County line ran right past the property and the rancho hosted a large number of tourists. At first, the Del Valles were not keen on having people run rampant through the buildings and orchards, but eventually capitalized on their newfound fame by branding their wine and oranges "The Home of Ramona Brand".^[4] After the Rübels took ownership, they continued to welcome visitors in small numbers, converting the second floor of the winery into a small museum with artifacts from the Del Valle family.

Tourists continued to arrive even after SP relocated their main line through the Santa Susana Pass in 1903. Two daily trains made stops at Camulos until the service was discontinued in the 1940s.

[edit] Grounds

There are fifteen buildings open to the public as part of the Rancho Camulos Museum, all of were built before 1930 and are still in their original locations. They are mostly built in Spanish Colonial or Mission Revival styles (the latter is derived from the former), but later buildings were done in differing architectural styles, more representing the period in which they were built. Landscaping features such as lawns, flower gardens, ornamental trees, and walkways separate the residential areas from the working portions of the ranch.

The main adobe, also called the Ygnacio del Valle adobe, is a 10,000 square foot (929 m²), twenty-room, U-shaped structure. When initially constructed in 1853, it was an L-shaped four-room house connected with an external corredor (as opposed to an interior hallway), as is typical of the Spanish Colonial style. It is unusual for its time period because around this time, the Monterey style was in vogue, as is evidenced by contemporaneous buildings in Santa Barbara.^[5] Rancho Los Alamos in Santa Barbara County, Rancho Guajome in Oceanside, and Rancho Las Flores in Santa Barbara, all National Historic Landmarks, are built in a similar vein.

The house expanded in several phases. In 1861 before the Del Valle family moved here permanently three additional rooms were added as well as a free-standing cocina (kitchen). A basement was installed under the new rooms as well. In the 1870s, another wing was added perpendicular to the 1861 attachment. Finally some time after 1895, one more room was added to the new wing, as well as a breezeway to the kitchen, completing the current shape. Further remodeling done after this time was to the interior only.

The basement of the house initially served as the wine storage area, but in 1867, a one-and-a-half-story brick winery was constructed. After 1900, when wine grapes were no longer grown commercially, this building served as a storage room. Rübel later converted it to a museum for Ramona visitors, complete with Del Valle family artifacts. Currently it is used for farm equipment and automobile storage.

To the west of the main house is a large California Black Walnut tree that was most likely planted by Juventino del Valle in the 1860s. It measures 25 feet (7.6 m) in circumference and its branches spread out almost half an acre (2,000 m²). It is believed to be the largest Black Walnut tree in the area.^[3]

The wooden chapel was constructed around 1867, replacing a makeshift chapel that had been set up in 1861. After the secularization of the missions, this chapel became known as the "lost mission"^[4], the only place of worship between Mission San Fernando and Mission San Buenaventura. Directly to the northwest of the chapel is a bell structure containing two bells on a freestanding frame, which were used to call worshipers to Mass. These were cast at Kodiak, Alaska, and one had previously been used at Mission San Fernando. A third bell was removed by one of the Del Valle daughters and is missing.

The exact dates of construction of the barn, gas station, and bunkhouse are unknown, but the American Craftsman style of architecture indicates it was between 1910 to 1916.^[10] The barn is located to the northwest of the living quarters, in the main work area. The gas station and bunkhouse are not depicted on the map.

The small adobe, next to the highway, was built by Nachito del Valle. This Spanish Colonial Revial house was constructed around 1920 and was damaged severely in the 1994 earthquake. After its reconstruction, it will serve as the museum's visitor center.

The schoolhouse, constructed in 1930, was the last to be built on the property. It was built by Rübel for his and his bookkeeper's families and designed to match the main adobe.

There are few buildings left on the north side of the highway. The most notable are the wooden Southern Pacific saltbox-style section house and workers' bunkhouse, both built in 1887. A train depot and post office both used to exist, but have been torn down. Finally, three farmworkers' bungalows, built by the Del Valle family in 1916, sit west of the section house.

[edit] Historic designations

• United States National Historic Landmark — added February 16, 2000^[1]
• United States National Register of Historic Places — reference number 96001137, added November 1, 1996^[2]
• California Historical Landmark — number 553^[16]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Rancho Camulos Museum web site
• Rancho Camulos, Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society

• Rancho Camulos is at coordinates 34°24′20″N 118°45′24″W / 34.405650, -118.756667 (Rancho Camulos)Coordinates: 34°24′20″N 118°45′24″W / 34.405650, -118.756667 (Rancho Camulos)

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