Montalvo was an unincorporated village in
Ventura County, California
Ventura County () is a county in the southern part of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 843,843. The largest city is Oxnard, and the county seat is the city of Ventura.
Ventura County comprises the Oxn ...
, founded in approximately 1887. It was incorporated into the city of
Ventura, California
Ventura, officially named San Buenaventura (Spanish for "Saint Bonaventure"), is a city on the Southern Coast of California and the county seat of Ventura County. The population was 110,763 at the 2020 census. Ventura is a popular tourist des ...
, in 2012. Montalvo is located in the southern portion of the city of Ventura, on the northern bank of the
Santa Clara River. It is bounded by Victoria Avenue to the west, Ralston Street to the north, Johnson Drive to the east, and the Ventura Freeway to the south.
History
Montalvo was founded in approximately 1887 when the Southern Pacific Railroad reached the location.
J. G. Hill, credited with being the "founder" of Montalvo, laid out plans for the town site in 1886.
Some accounts indicate that the community was named after
Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo
Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo (; c. 1450 – 1505) was a Castilian author who arranged the modern version of the chivalric romance '' Amadis of Gaul'', originally written in three books in the 14th century by an unknown author. Montalvo incorpora ...
, the
Spanish
Spanish might refer to:
* Items from or related to Spain:
**Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain
**Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries
**Spanish cuisine
Other places
* Spanish, Ontario, Can ...
author who first described the
Island of California
The Island of California ( es, Isla de California) refers to a long-held European misconception, dating from the 16th century, that the Baja California Peninsula was not part of mainland North America but rather a large island (spelled on ea ...
in the 1510 novel ''Las Sergas de Esplandián''.
In its early days, Montalvo was served by the Washington Street railroad depot.[ The depot was the terminus of the Southern Pacific Railroad in Ventura County.][ Goods destined for Ventura and Port Hueneme were unloaded at Montalvo and taken by cart to those locations.] The community also became a center for growing and processing apricots.[ A school was built on Grand Avenue in 1889. In the 19th century, the community had a newspaper called the ''Montalvo Courier'' or the ''Evening Monitor''.][ It was a thriving community in the late 19th century. In the late 1880s, the ]University of Southern California
The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...
planned to establish a satellite campus, to be known as the "Collegiate Institute", on a grassy knoll in Montalvo.[ According to one account: "There was a splendid hotel beside the large depot. The town boasted a daily newspaper, a Chinese laundry, a general store and post office that was the center of life along the river."][ Montalvo promoters touted the community as "the Pasadena of Ventura County."][
In the early 1900s, after railroad service was extended to Oxnard, most of the homes in Montalvo were physically relocated across the Santa Clara River to Oxnard.][ Oxnard became a boom town, and home mover John Brakey developed a thriving business loading homes on rollers and moving them across the dry river bed from Montalvo to Oxnard.][ During this time, Montalvo also lost its newspaper and printing press.][ By the 1920s, most of Montalvo's population had relocated elsewhere.][
After ]World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, several residential neighborhoods were built in Montalvo. In 1952, the community formed the Montalvo Sanitary District (later renamed the Montalvo Municipal Improvement District) and built a sewage treatment plant to facilitate further development. Development was halted in 1958 when the Ventura County Health Department found the sewage treatment plant to be inadequate. After improvement to the sewage facilities, development resumed.[
In 1961, Ventura County master plan consultants proposed developing Montalvo as "the core of an urban region" covering Ventura, Oxnard, Point Hueneme, and Saticoy, which was predicted to reach a population of 700,000 by 1980 and 2,000,000 by the year 2020. The consultants proposed making Montalvo the hub of Ventura County government, culture, and transportation, including development of a civic center and a state college.
In 1967, the ]Ventura Freeway
The Ventura Freeway is a freeway in southern California, United States, running from the Santa Barbara/Ventura county line to Pasadena in Los Angeles County. It is the principal east-west route (designated north-south) through Ventura County a ...
was constructed through Montalvo, resulting in significant financial losses to local merchants.
Annexation and crime problems
In the 1980s, residents debated proposals to accept annexation of Montalvo into the city of Ventura. An initial effort at annexation was defeated in 1992.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the city of Ventura moved eastward and 35 apartment buildings were constructed on three Montalvo streets south of the Bristol Shopping Center. By 1990, Montalvo had a population of 4,630 and a median household income of $46,602. In the 1990s, the area began to experience increased blight and crime, including fights, drug dealing and tagging, as two gangs claimed the apartment area as their territory. In 1994, the Ventura Police Department opened a storefront substation in Montalvo to attempt to fight the increased crime.[
Montalvo was finally annexed into the city of Ventura in September 2012.
]
Landmarks
Notable landmarks in Montalvo included Sam Korb's Trading Post, Loop's Restaurant, Little Heidelberg Restaurant, and The White Spot.[
Montalvo also was home to a mound in the northern part of the community that was thought to be the work of native Americans. It was described in the 1890s as having an altitude of 150 feet with smoothly sloping sides and approximately one-quarter mile in length.][ Later press reports indicate that large portions of the mound were removed to be used as fill dirt.
]
See also
* East Ventura station
East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth.
Etymology
As in other languages, the word is formed from the f ...
* West Montalvo Oil Field
The West Montalvo Oil Field is a large and productive oil field on the coast of Ventura County, California, in the United States, in and adjacent to the city of Oxnard, California. Discovered in 1947, it has produced approximately of oil, and ret ...
References
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Ventura County, California
Ventura, California
Neighborhoods in Ventura County, California