The Pacific Ocean House was the first luxury hotel in
Santa Cruz. It was built in 1866 by
Amasa Pray and William H. Moore. Located on the west side of the upper end of
Pacific Avenue, it became the premier hotel of Santa Cruz.
The Pacific Ocean House boasted 100 rooms as well as beautiful gardens and croquet grounds. Most importantly it was the terminus of the stage line from Santa Clara. It was purchased around 1888 by local entrepreneur F.A. Hihn who added a third story. Sadly the hotel burned to the ground in 1907.
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| Pacific Ocean House, 1866 - Library of Congress |
The Pacific Ocean House boasted 100 rooms as well as beautiful gardens and croquet grounds. Most importantly it was the terminus of the stage line from Santa Clara. It was purchased around 1888 by local entrepreneur F.A. Hihn who added a third story. Sadly the hotel burned to the ground in 1907.
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| Pacific Ocean House rented rooms from $2.00 and up - Author's Personal Collection |
A
circa 1880s Pacific Ocean House advertisement featured Santa Cruz’s
most important tourist destinations, its ocean cliffs and the famous Big
Trees Grove. Not surprisingly many well-to-do visitors to Big Trees Grove stopped
over at the Pacific Ocean House. These included the noted caricaturist and
political cartoonist Thomas Nast in 1888 and Adolphus Busch, founder of
Anheuser-Busch Brewing in 1886. That year Busch was traveling in California in
celebration of his silver wedding anniversary.
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| Circa 1880s Pacific Ocean House advertisement card shows both Santa Cruz's natural bridges and a lady visitor standing next to the Giant at Big Trees Grove - Author's Personal Collection |
In 1883 a gentleman from New York gave the following account
of his trip:
“Our party made a short stop at the hotels, skipped the bathing, but with as little delay as possible undertook the mountain road that leads to the Big Trees, seven miles distant. The mountain roads found in going about California had to me a charm possessed by nothing else. A narrow line cut in the side of a mountain, with thousands of feet of perpendicular earth upward on one side, and eternity and a mountain torrent on the other, describes the situation in a sentence. Our road on this day was graded to such a nicety that the ascent was not tiresome in the least. We rose steadily and gained elevation at every step. The stately redwoods, a hundred feet high, as straight as an arrow, and small enough for the mast to a vessel, pushed their tops up to our narrow way from below, while the bay tree whipped our faces with its fragrant foliage and the azalias, now in full bloom, filled the air with their delicate perfume, and enriched the scene with their wonderous beauty. It was this road that we followed to the Big Trees. The grove, numbering about twenty trees, of enormous growth, is nearly encircled by the mountain brook in which trout abound, (the San Lorenzo Creek), a stream clear and cold that we followed from the base of the mountain. The smaller trees with bountiful foliage unite to make the place a charming retreat in a dense forest … We found many camping parties in these woods, some of them rustricating in a delightful neglige,with a Chinaman cook and all accessories to a thorough vacation."
"Our retreat down the mountain side was charming as the ascent, and before night we were again under the shelter of the Pacific Ocean House, thinking of our next trip, which is to be by the narrow gauge South Pacific over the coast range, through the rich Santa Clara Valley and so on to San Francisco."
“Our party made a short stop at the hotels, skipped the bathing, but with as little delay as possible undertook the mountain road that leads to the Big Trees, seven miles distant. The mountain roads found in going about California had to me a charm possessed by nothing else. A narrow line cut in the side of a mountain, with thousands of feet of perpendicular earth upward on one side, and eternity and a mountain torrent on the other, describes the situation in a sentence. Our road on this day was graded to such a nicety that the ascent was not tiresome in the least. We rose steadily and gained elevation at every step. The stately redwoods, a hundred feet high, as straight as an arrow, and small enough for the mast to a vessel, pushed their tops up to our narrow way from below, while the bay tree whipped our faces with its fragrant foliage and the azalias, now in full bloom, filled the air with their delicate perfume, and enriched the scene with their wonderous beauty. It was this road that we followed to the Big Trees. The grove, numbering about twenty trees, of enormous growth, is nearly encircled by the mountain brook in which trout abound, (the San Lorenzo Creek), a stream clear and cold that we followed from the base of the mountain. The smaller trees with bountiful foliage unite to make the place a charming retreat in a dense forest … We found many camping parties in these woods, some of them rustricating in a delightful neglige,with a Chinaman cook and all accessories to a thorough vacation."
"Our retreat down the mountain side was charming as the ascent, and before night we were again under the shelter of the Pacific Ocean House, thinking of our next trip, which is to be by the narrow gauge South Pacific over the coast range, through the rich Santa Clara Valley and so on to San Francisco."
Sources: “California
– Monterey, Santa Cruz, and the Big Trees,” Westfield Republican
[Westfield, New York], July 18, 1883; “Santa Cruz Yesterdays," Santa Cruz Sentinel, August 1, 1948; “Celebrating
Santa Cruz’s 150th Anniversary,” in Goodtimes by Geoffrey
Dunn, September 28, 2016; http://goodtimes.sc/cover-stories/celebrating-santa-cruz-150th-anniveresary
do you think they walked, rode horses or were in a carriage?
ReplyDeleteThe article didn't state their mode of transportation but since they mentioned that the bay trees whipped their faces and it took them until almost nightfall to return to the hotel, I assume they were on horseback.
ReplyDelete