Rancho Refugio was a
Mexican land grant
The Spanish and Mexican governments made many concessions and land grants in Alta California (now known as California) and Baja California from 1775 to 1846. The Spanish Concessions of land were made to retired soldiers as an inducement for ...
in present-day
Santa Cruz County, California
Santa Cruz County (), officially the County of Santa Cruz, is a county on the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 270,861. The county seat is Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz County comprises the Santa ...
given in 1839 by Governor
Juan B. Alvarado
Juan Bautista Valentín Alvarado y Vallejo (February 14, 1809 – July 13, 1882) was a Californio politician that served as Governor of Alta California from 1837-42. Prior to his term as governor, Alvarado briefly led a movement for independen ...
to María Candida, Jacinta, and María de los Angeles Castro. The grant extended along the Pacific coast from the western city limit of
Santa Cruz to Laguna Creek, a border shared with
Rancho Arroyo de la Laguna (not far from
Davenport).
History
As
Mission Santa Cruz
Mission Santa Cruz (''La Misión de la Exaltación de la Santa Cruz'', which translates as the Mission of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross), was the twelfth of twenty-one Spanish missions in California (today's U.S. state), established by the Fr ...
developed following its establishment in 1791, the coastal terrace lands to the north as far as
Point Año Nuevo became the mission's main livestock grazing lands. ''Rancho Arroyo del Matadero'' (stream of the slaughtering ground ranch) was one of four mission cattle ranches strung along the coast. In 1839, the former ranch lands were granted to the three Castro sisters: María Candida, Jacinta, and María de los Angeles Castro. The three were daughters of
José Joaquín Castro
José is a predominantly Spanish and Portuguese form of the given name Joseph. While spelled alike, this name is pronounced differently in each language: Spanish ; Portuguese (or ).
In French, the name ''José'', pronounced , is an old vernacul ...
(1768–1838), deceased grantee of
Rancho San Andrés
Rancho San Andrés was a Mexican land grant in present-day Santa Cruz County, California given in 1833 by Governor José Figueroa to José Joaquín Castro. The grant on Monterey Bay extended from La Selva Beach on the north to Watsonville Slo ...
. Candida Castro married José Antonio Bolcoff in 1822.
![Bolcoff adobe at Wilder Ranch State Park, 2013](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Bolcoff_adobe_at_Wilder_Ranch_State_Park%2C_2013.jpg)
José Antonio Bolcoff (1794–1866) was born Osip Volkov in
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky ( rus, Петропавловск-Камчатский, a=Петропавловск-Камчатский.ogg, p=pʲɪtrɐˈpavləfsk kɐmˈtɕatskʲɪj) is a city and the administrative, industrial, scientific, and cultur ...
,
Siberia
Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part of ...
. Working for a Russian fur trading company, Bolcoff deserted a Russian ship at
Monterey
Monterey (; es, Monterrey; Ohlone: ) is a city located in Monterey County on the southern edge of Monterey Bay on the U.S. state of California's Central Coast. Founded on June 3, 1770, it functioned as the capital of Alta California under both ...
in 1815. After arriving in California he quickly assimilated into the Spanish culture, using the Spanish name José Antonio Bolcoff. Bolcoff acted as an interpreter for Governor
Pablo Vicente de Solá
Pablo Vicente de Solá (1761–1826) was a Spanish officer and the twelfth and last Spanish colonial governor of Alta California (1815-1822). He was born in Mondragón, Gipuzkoa, Spain.
Land grants
Solá granted in 1821 the Rancho Rincón de los ...
. In 1822, Bolcoff settled in
Branciforte
Branciforte, originally named Villa de Branciforte, was the last of only three secular ''pueblos'' founded by the Spanish colonial government of Alta California. The pueblo was established in 1797 on the eastern bluff of the San Lorenzo River, fac ...
and was
alcalde
Alcalde (; ) is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An ''alcalde'' was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian '' cabildo'' (the municipal council) a ...
in 1833. In 1833, Bolcoff was granted
Rancho San Agustin Rancho San Agustin was a Mexican land grant in present-day Santa Cruz County, California given in 1833 by Governor José Figueroa to José Antonio Bolcoff. The grant was bounded by the San Lorenzo River on the west and Rancho Carbonera on the sou ...
, which he sold to Joseph Ladd Majors (1806–1868) in 1839. Majors married Bolcoff's sister-in-law, María de los Angeles Castro (1818–1903). Jacinta Castro lived with the Bolcoff family before joining the convent at Monterey. In 1839, Bolcoff replaced Francisco Soto as administrator of Mission Santa Cruz.
Bolcoff's name is not mentioned in the original grant, but he took control of Rancho Refugio in 1841. Bolcoff transferred the title to Rancho Refugio to his two sons, Francisco Bolcoff and Juan Bolcoff.
With the
cession
The act of cession is the assignment of property to another entity. In international law it commonly refers to land transferred by treaty. Ballentine's Law Dictionary defines cession as "a surrender; a giving up; a relinquishment of jurisdictio ...
of California to the United States following the
Mexican-American War
Mexican Americans ( es, mexicano-estadounidenses, , or ) are Americans of full or partial Mexicans, Mexican heritage. In 2019, Mexican Americans comprised 11.3% of the US population and 61.5% of all Hispanic and Latino Americans. In 2019, 71% ...
, the 1848
Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo ( es, Tratado de Guadalupe Hidalgo), officially the Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits, and Settlement between the United States of America and the United Mexican States, is the peace treaty that was signed on 2 ...
provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho Refugio was filed with the
Public Land Commission
The California Land Act of 1851 (), enacted following the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the admission of California as a state in 1850, established a three-member Public Land Commission to determine the validity of prior Spanish and Mexican la ...
in 1852, and the grant was
patented
A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A p ...
to Francisco and Juan Bolcoff in 1860. A claim by Joseph Ladd Majors and his wife, María de los Angeles Castro, for one-third of Rancho Refugio filed with the Land Commission in 1852 was rejected.
In 1846, Moses A. Meder (often spelled Meader in public records) came by ship to
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...
. Meder moved to Santa Cruz County and made a living building lumber mills and giving small loans on properties. In 1854, Meder foreclosed on Bolcoff's mortgage on an eastern portion of Rancho Refugio. Meder moved his family onto the ranch in 1859, on today's Meder Street. The western section of Meder's ranch, at the edge of the Santa Cruz city limits, is now the Moore Creek Open Space.
Upon Bolcoff's death, his sons sold all their rights to a Charles E. Norton. By that time, perhaps twenty persons held claims for Rancho Refugio. In 1866, Meder took Norton to court to prove his claim on the eastern two-thirds of Rancho Refugio. The case of Meader v. Norton went all the way to the
US Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point of ...
. In 1870, the Supreme Court ruled that the grant was legally made to all three Castro sisters. The court found that "...the husband of one of the sisters, named Bolcoff, suppressed or destroyed this grant and fabricated a pretended grant to himself of the land, and also certain other papers intended to prove the genuineness of such fabricated grant." The court further found that Meder did legally own a two-thirds interest in Rancho Refugio.
''Meader v. Norton'', 1870, U.S. Supreme Court, 78 U.S. 11 Wall. 442
/ref>
With enough of the legal issues resolved, John T. Fairbanks began buying up claims against the eastern two-thirds of Rancho Refugio in 1870. In 1871, Fairbanks sold his interest in Rancho Refugio to dairyman partners Levi K. Baldwin and Deloss D. Wilder. In 1885, the Baldwin Wilder partnership was dissolved, and the Wilder family moved onto the rancho. The Wilder family lived on and worked their land until 1969, when it was sold for residential and commercial development. Local opposition to this plan led to its purchase by the state in 1974, and the establishment of Wilder Ranch State Park.
References
{{California history
Refugio
Ranchos of Santa Cruz County, California