The photo above, captioned “View in Poway Valley,” is from the book, Picturesque San Diego. Published in 1887, the book offers images and stories about a far less populated, more rural San Diego County than the one we’re familiar with today. Join me as I present some of these images and stories at the Oasis Lifelong Learning Center in La Mesa on Thursday, May 8. Click on the link below to learn more and sign up.

Above is a photo of a vineyard and the ranch house at the Rancho Santa Margarita taken in 1887. It was a time when farming and ranching were still the backbone of San Diego County’s economy. Come join me for my Oasis talk, “Ranchos in San Diego History,” on Friday, April 11, at 10 a.m. at the Oasis Rancho Bernardo Lifelong Learning Center. Go to the San Diego Oasis website, click on “Classes,” then type in “2351” to register. Hope to see you there!

First, the bad news: the California Historical Society (CHS), announced that it had gone out of business. Now the good news: while the society has closed, it has transferred its collection to the Stanford University Library.

CHS, a private non-profit, was founded in 1871 and based in San Francisco. Its collection includes over 600,000 items, from books and newspaper archives to photographs and videotapes. It contains original material from events like the 1848 Gold Rush and the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire, as well as archives on business, political and social organizations from the Northern California ACLU and California’s floral industry to the Peoples Temple.

While CHS was designated as an official state historical society in 1979, it suffered over the decades from a lack of state support as well as lagging support from private benefactors. To their credit, the society’s leaders always chose ways to keep their collection open and accessible rather than to shut it down. Thankfully, their efforts to save history have succeeded.

Here’s a link to the press release from the Stanford University Libraries on their acquisition of the collection:

Below is an item from the San Diego Union of February 11, 1904:

The Stowe Literary Society met every other Saturday for a number of years at the schoolhouse in the town of Stowe. The presentation of music, discussion of the works of noted authors, and readings from a journal written by local residents on life in the town were part of the regular meeting agenda. Reading about it now makes me think of it as an early form of social media, in real time as opposed to online, and showing an interest in facts and learning.

Note also that among the musicians contributing music were two people “present from Foster.”  Foster, like Stowe, was another San Diego County town which once thrived but then disappeared.

To find out more about such places, join me for my Oasis talk, “Lost Towns of San Diego County,” on Friday, January 17th, at 1 p.m. at the Oasis Grossmont Lifelong Learning Center.  Click on the link below to sign up:

Wishing Happy Holidays and A Historically Happy New Year to All!