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From benign settlements, during the time of Ortega’s Nuestra Señora del Refugio land grant, and throughout almost one hundred years of Hollister family ownership, the area now known as the Hollister Ranch remained a remote, Arcadian refuge on the California coast.
25 miles of sandstone canyons and coastal prairie comprise the Hollister Ranch, stretching between Gaviota and Jalama, towards Point Conception.
Prehistory inhabitants were the Chumash. Archaeological digs yield 10,000 years of existence of these local peoples. Reported by the three diarists: Portolá, Costansó and Crespí of the 1769 Alta California overland expedition, “the Chumash had a high population density here and had established a complex social organization in their villages.”
In 1791, the sergeant who rode ahead of the men on Portolá’s expedition, the man who would first communicate with the natives, who is titled as the first European-descendent to discover the Bay of San Francisco, the first non-native to navigate the Bay of San Francisco, and the man who founded Santa Barbara’s Presidio, Sergeant José Francisco Ortega received Alta California’s 4th Spanish land concession, Rancho Nuestra Señora del Refugio. Between 1858 and 1866, Ortega’s Rancho sold in various acreages from Ortega’s descendents to American settlers. 3 of the parcels were purchased by William Welles Hollister.
“W.W.,” as he is referred to in historical narratives, herded 4,000 sheep from Ohio to California in 1853. Sheep were a profitable product in those post-Gold Rush days, and with his earned monies, W.W. purchased half of Rancho San Justo, which is now the area around Hollister, California. He sold his share of San Justo in 1868 and then purchased the 3 parcels that made up his ranch in Santa Barbara County. In 1909, his son Jim took ownership of the Ranch with a determination to keep solvent his cattle concern that got him through 50 years of poor markets, family differences, and drought.
If you have a spare $40 bucks, spend it on Nancy Ward’s “The Hollister Ranch, Its History, Preservation and People.” The history of The Hollister Ranch is told through the stories of the Hollister family, paintings by plein-air artists, and by interspersed editorials called, Windows on the Ranch.
Michael Drury‘s “Artist’s View of the Ranch” tells us, “I remember these huge white beaches. I think it was Big Drakes because you could get down across the railroad track. There was a clubhouse that the surf guys had built – it’s now long gone, fallen off the cliff.”
Michael worked at the Ranch, starting in 1970, cleaning the place up, mending fences and taking care of piles of rubbish. ”Michael would get off work at 4:30 and go down to the beach at Rights and Lefts. ”We would surf these south summer swells by ourselves, and unless there were boats, there was nobody around. There were places that hadn’t even been explored in those days.”"
“Today the Ranch remains unchanged from what it was in the days of the Chumash and the Hollisters. This is due to the minimal development allowed under the Conditions, Covenants and Restrictions which impose strict legal restrictions on owners’ use of the land, and a philosophy of ownership that values the character of the natural environment.”
“The CC&R’s” which are a part of every parcel deed, begin with the following statement: ”All who become owners of property subject to this Declaration are motivated by the character of the natural environment in which it is located, and accept … the principle that the development and use of the property must preserve that character for present and future enjoyment of all the owners.”"
Each parcel was surveyed in 1971 and 1972 by horseback and aerial photography. Engineers and geologists, under the direction of the Ranch’s property manager, located water for each parcel, graded access roads by following some of the cattle trails, and established each 100 acre parcel boundary. 133 100-acre parcels present a variety of features and views across the 14,400 acre ranch. ”In 1973, each parcel on the Ranch was issued its own agricultural preserve contract. Each agricultural preserve contract is allowed one principal residence, and with restrictions, a guest house. No other residences are allowed. To qualify for the Agricultural Preserve Program, a parcel must either be in the cooperative livestock grazing program, or be in production agriculture.”
One blemish of industry appearing along the western edge of the ranch provides California history, “In the late nineteenth century there was an intense effort to complete the railroad line between northern and southern California. Because they needed to move their sheep and cattle to market, the Hollisters were strong advocates of the coastal rail line. When it was determined that the best route would be along the edge of the coast through the Ranch, the Hollisters eagerly negotiated a 60-foot-wide corridor for the railroad. This was not an easement, but a property transfer. In return, the Hollisters were to have two sidings for loading passengers and cattle: one at San Augustine, and one at Santa Anita. The were also to have lifetime free rail travel and the right to flag down the train at those two sidings.”
The Coast Road does not continue west through the ranch, and instead bypasses the entire western mass that leads to the point, as it turns north at Gaviota conjoined with 101 through the famous Gaviota Pass. This routing of CA State Route 1 allows for an ancient California history to presently remain westward from Gaviota, around Point Conception, and north to Pt. Sal.
Used to be that psychedelic magic buses drove the Coast Highway. They’ve long disappeared now. A few are still around, parked long ago under the tree canopy of the redwood and oak forests. Aging and decaying. Now dusty, dirty, and grey, their faded swirls of paint across the nose, sides, and top.
I’ve seen one between Briceland and Thorn Junction on the road out to Shelter Cove. Another was up in La Honda, like an extinct species, for La Honda used to house many of these buses.
But this bus before me, in the photo above, was all green. A green, mid-size bus. A driver, a passenger. Lots of bikes on back.
It’d be nice to have a bus this size, an electric bus one of several, providing bus service all-along the California coast.
