Santa Rosa Island (

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 ...

: ''Isla de Santa Rosa'';

Chumash Chumash may refer to: *Chumash (Judaism), a Hebrew word for the Pentateuch, used in Judaism *Chumash people, a Native American people of southern California *Chumashan languages, indigenous languages of California See also *Chumash traditional n ...

: ''Wi'ma'') is the second largest of the

Channel Islands of California The Channel Islands () are an eight-island archipelago located within the Southern California Bight in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of California. The four Northern Channel Islands are part of the Transverse Ranges geologic province, ...

at 53,195 acres (215.27 km² or 83.118 sq mi). Santa Rosa is located about off the coast of

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara ( es, Santa Bárbara, meaning "Saint Barbara") is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Co ...

Santa Barbara County Santa Barbara County, California, officially the County of Santa Barbara, is located in Southern California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 448,229. The county seat is Santa Barbara, and the largest city is Santa Maria. Santa Barba ...

and is part of

Channel Islands National Park Channel Islands National Park consists of five of the eight Channel Islands off the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California. Although the islands are close to the shore of the densely populated state, they have been relatively undevelope ...

. The

, a Native American people lived on the Channel Islands at the time of European contact. The remains of a 13,000-year-old

Arlington Springs Man The Arlington Springs man is a set of Late Pleistocene human remains discovered in 1959 on Santa Rosa Island, one of the Channel Islands located off the coast of Southern California. The Arlington Springs archeological site is protected within n ...

, possibly the oldest human remains in the Americas, were discovered on the island in 1959. Santa Rosa Island is home to the rare Torrey Pine, a species of pine tree that exists only in two locations around the world.

Geography

The terrain consists of rolling hills, deep canyons, and a coastal lagoon. Highest peak is Vail Peak, at . During the last ice age, the four northern Channel Islands, including Santa Rosa Island, were conjoined into

Santa Rosae Santa Rosae (also spelled Santarosae) was, before the end of the last ice age, an ancient landmass off the coast of present-day southern California, near Santa Barbara County and Ventura County, of which the northern Channel Islands of California ...

, a single island that was only five miles (8 km) off the coast.

History

Early history

The ancestors of the Chumash Indians lived on Santa Rosa for many thousands of years, establishing numerous village sites along the coast and in the interior. Recent research has documented the presence of maritime Paleocoastal peoples on the island at least 12,000 years ago. The Chumash called the

driftwood __NOTOC__ Driftwood is wood that has been washed onto a shore or beach of a sea, lake, or river by the action of winds, tides or waves. In some waterfront areas, driftwood is a major nuisance. However, the driftwood provides shelter and fo ...

that washed up on the sandy beaches by the channel currents ''wimal''. The logs were used to build ''

tomol A ''tomol'' or ''tomolo'' (Chumash) or ''te'aat'' or ''ti'at'' (Tongva/Kizh) are plank-built boats, historically and currently in the Santa Barbara and Los Angeles area. They replaced or supplemented tule reed boats. The boats were between in l ...

s'' (plank canoes).

Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo ''Juan'' is a given name, the Spanish and Manx versions of ''John''. It is very common in Spain and in other Spanish-speaking communities around the world and in the Philippines, and also (pronounced differently) in the Isle of Man. In Spanish, t ...

's crew visited the island after his death, and found three Chumash villages, containing a total of 40-50 people. They called their island Wima, but George Vancouver listed it as Santa Rosa on his 1792 chart. He reported that this name appeared on a Spanish chart in his possession.

Franciscan The Franciscans are a group of related Mendicant orders, mendicant Christianity, Christian Catholic religious order, religious orders within the Catholic Church. Founded in 1209 by Italian Catholic friar Francis of Assisi, these orders include t ...

missionaries baptized a large number in 1822 and most were removed to their

Mission Santa Barbara Mission Santa Barbara ( es, link=no, Misión de Santa Bárbara) is a Spanish mission in Santa Barbara, California. Often referred to as the ‘Queen of the Missions,’ it was founded by Padre Fermín Lasuén for the Franciscan order on December ...

and

Mission San Buenaventura Mission San Buenaventura ( es, Misión San Buenaventura), formally known as the Mission Basilica of San Buenaventura, is a Catholic parish and basilica in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles. The parish church in the city of Ventura, California, Unite ...

by the late 1820s.

Land grants

George Nidever George Nidever (also spelled Nidiver; December 20, 1802 – March 24, 1883) was an American mountain man, explorer, fur trapper, memoirist and sailor. In the 1830s he became one of the first wave of American settlers to move to Mexican California, ...

hunted

sea otter The sea otter (''Enhydra lutris'') is a marine mammal native to the coasts of the northern and eastern North Pacific Ocean. Adult sea otters typically weigh between , making them the heaviest members of the weasel family, but among the small ...

s for their pelts in the late 1830s and 1840s, under a license granted by the Mexican government to William Dana. Governor Manuel Micheltorena made 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 ...

of the island of Santa Rosa to brothers

José Antonio Carrillo Captain José Antonio Ezequiel Carrillo (1796–1862) was a Californio politician, ranchero, and signer of the Californian Constitution in 1849. He served three terms as Alcalde of Los Angeles (mayor). History A member of the prominent Carrill ...

and

Carlos Antonio Carrillo Carlos Antonio Carrillo (24 December 1783 – 23 February 1852) was a Californio politician, military officer, and ranchero. He was nominated to serve as Governor of Alta California from 1837–38, in opposition to Juan Bautista Alvarado's rule. ...

in 1843. They gave the island to Carlos' daughters, Manuela Carrillo de Jones and Francisca Carrillo de Thompson. Their husbands,

John Coffin Jones John Coffin Jones Jr. (1796 – December 24, 1861) was the first United States Consular Agent to the Kingdom of Hawaii. Early life John Coffin Jones Jr. was born in 1796 in Boston, Massachusetts, and baptized on June 26, 1796, by the minister of ...

(1796–1861) and Alpheus Basil Thompson (1795–1869), entered into a partnership to manage the island. In 1852, the Channel Islands were ceded to the United States by

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

in the

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 ...

ending the

Mexican–American War The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the (''United States intervention in Mexico''), was an armed conflict between the United States and Mexico from 1846 to 1848. It followed the 1 ...

. Also in 1852, a claim was filed with the Public Land Commission, but the grant was not patented to Manuela Carrillo de Jones and Francisca Carrillo de Thompson until 1871, though a district court confirmed clear title in 1856. Then, the Thompson-Jones partnership started to come apart in 1857. By 1870, the More brothers, consisting of Thomas Wallace (T.W.), Alexander (A.P.), and Henry had bought out all of the interests, and A.P. and Henry became joint owners of the island. They transformed the island into a large sheep ranch, with headquarters at Bechers Bay.

20th century

The More family sold the island to Walter L. Vail and John V. Vickers in 1902. The Vail and Vickers Company transformed the sheep ranch into a cattle fattening operation. The

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army of the United States in the U.S. Constitution.Article II, section 2, cla ...

leased 46 acres for a

radar Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the distance (''ranging''), angle, and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, w ...

post during WW II, and erected 16 buildings for 75 men, between Jan. and Aug. 1943. The site was abandoned after the end of the war. The

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

built a 200-man,

early-warning radar An early-warning radar is any radar system used primarily for the long-range detection of its targets, i.e., allowing defences to be alerted as ''early'' as possible before the intruder reaches its target, giving the air defences the maximum t ...

site in 1952 during the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

. At the same time, the

United States Navy The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...

built a communication station on 4.5 acres on Navy Hill, to track missiles launched from

Point Mugu NAS Naval Air Station Point Mugu was a United States Navy, United States naval air station near Oxnard, California, which operated as an independent Military base, base from 1941 to 2000, when it merged with nearby Naval Construction Battalion Center ...

. The Air Force cancelled its lease in 1963. Standard Oil Company obtained an exploration lease in 1932, but came up empty.

Richfield Oil Company Richfield Oil Corporation was an American petroleum company based in California from 1905 to 1966. In 1966 it merged with Atlantic Refining Company to form the Atlantic Richfield Company (later renamed ARCO). History The Richfield Oil Corpora ...

in 1938, and Superior Oil Company in 1947 were equally unsuccessful. In 1971

Mobil Mobil is a petroleum brand owned and operated by American oil and gas corporation ExxonMobil. The brand was formerly owned and operated by an oil and gas corporation of the same name, which itself merged with Exxon to form ExxonMobil in 1999. ...

Oil Corporation obtained a lease and drilled six unsuccessful wells, plugging and abandoning the last one in 1975.

National park

In 1980, Santa Rosa Island was included within

over the objections of Vail & Vickers, which then successfully lobbied to have the legislation stipulate that purchase of their land would be the highest priority of the Channel Islands National Park. Vail & Vickers sold the island in 1986 for nearly $30 million. Subsequently, the National Park Service issued a series of five-year renewable special use permits. Threatened lawsuits in 1996 resulted in a settlement agreement, which included the end of all hunting and ranching operations, such that only one steer remained by 1998. Vail's 25 year use and occupancy agreement ended in December 2011. In 2006 U.S. Representative Duncan Hunter (R-CA) introduced a provision into the annual defense policy bill that would allow disabled veterans to continue hunting elk on the island past 2011, without the consent of Vail & Vickers or the National Park Service. The provision stayed in the bill and was signed into law by President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

. This legislation was repealed by the next Congress as part of the FY 2007 Omnibus appropriations bill, also signed into law by President George W. Bush.

Activities

Recreational activities on Santa Rosa Island include kayaking, camping and hiking. A private boat charter company offers a number of trips to the island year round, and camping reservations can be made through Channel Islands National Park offices in

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 ...

. A year-round charter flight service is available from Camarillo Airport for hikers and campers to Santa Rosa Island.

CSUCI Research Station

In November 2012 the National Park Service (NPS) issued a permit to

California State University, Channel Islands California State University Channel Islands (CSUCI, CSU Channel Islands) is a public university in Camarillo, California. It opened in 2002 as the 23rd campus in the California State University system. CSUCI is located on the Central Coast of C ...

(CSUCI) to operate a field research station on Santa Rosa Island. The mission of the CSUCI Santa Rosa Island Research Station (SRIRS) is "to encourage and advance the interdisciplinary knowledge and stewardship of our natural and cultural resources through long-term research, inquiry-based education, and public outreach. (...) (and) to react energetically, adeptly, and successfully to our changing natural and human landscapes."

Ecology and climate

A variety of the Torrey pine (''Pinus torreyana'' var. ''insularis'') grows on the island. The population of this

endangered species An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and inv ...

is estimated at approximately 1000 trees. The

island oak ''Quercus tomentella'', the island oak, island live oak, or Channel Island oak, is an oak in the section Quercus section Protobalanus, ''Protobalanus''. It is native to six islands: five of the Channel Islands of California and Guadalupe Island ...

(''Quercus tomentella'') is native to the island. Flightless geese, giant mice and

pygmy mammoth The pygmy mammoth or Channel Islands mammoth (''Mammuthus exilis'') is an extinct species of dwarf elephant descended from the Columbian mammoth (''M. columbi'') of mainland North America. This species became extinct during the Quaternary extin ...

s are extinct, while the

island fox The island fox (''Urocyon littoralis'') is a small fox that is endemic to six of the eight Channel Islands of California. There are six subspecies, each unique to the island it lives on, reflecting its evolutionary history. They are generally d ...

spotted skunk The genus ''Spilogale'' includes all skunks commonly known as spotted skunks. Currently, there are four accepted extant species: ''S. gracilis'', ''S. putorius'', ''S. pygmaea'', and ''S. angustifrons''. New research, however, proposes that ther ...

, and munchkin dudleya (''Dudleya gnoma'')The Nature Conservancy: ''D. gnoma''
/ref> (one of the six endemic plant species on the island) still live there. The island is home to one of only three known populations of Hoffman's rockcress. Its surrounding waters serve as an invaluable nursery for the sea life that feeds larger marine mammals and seabirds. Great white sharks are fairly common in the northern Channel Islands (especially San Miguel and Santa Rosa) and feed on the abundant marine mammals. The rare endemic lichen '' Caloplaca obamae'', discovered in 2007 and described by

Kerry Knudsen Kerry or Kerri may refer to: * Kerry (name), a given name and surname of Gaelic origin (including a list of people with the name) Places * Kerry, Queensland, Australia * County Kerry, Ireland ** Kerry Airport, an international airport in Count ...

in 2009, commemorates United States President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

. Santa Rosa Island has a

warm-summer Mediterranean climate A Mediterranean climate (also called a dry summer temperate climate ''Cs'') is a temperate climate sub-type, generally characterized by warm, dry summers and mild, fairly wet winters; these weather conditions are typically experienced in the ...

(''Csb'' in the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

Archaeology

The remains of

s (''Mammuthus exilis''), which appear to have gone extinct about 13,000 years ago, have been excavated on the island. Archaeologist Phil Orr of the

Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History The Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum in Santa Barbara, California. It reconnects more than 150,000 people each year (including their 5,700 members) to nature indoors and outdoors. Nestled in nature, the museum ...

was the founder of research on the prehistory of Santa Rosa Island. After conducting 25 years of field research here, he published the results of his work in 1968. In 1959, Orr discovered the remains of 13,000-year-old

, the oldest reliably dated human remains in the Americas, on the island. The remains were found in an arroyo 37 feet below the existing ground surface. They were carefully preserved, and were finally analyzed in 1987, when radiocarbon dating methods were improved, by scientists Don Morris and John Johnson.Arlington Springs Man.
Channel Islands Film, 2016 Back 13,000 years ago, the site of the discovery would have been an interior island location, several miles from where the coast then existed. The archaeologically sensitive areas of the island were listed as a historic district on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...

in 2022.

Gallery

File:Santa rosa beach.JPG, Beach by the pier File:Santa Rosa Pier.jpg, Pier at Santa Rosa Island File:White_sandy_beach_on_Santa_Rosa_Island.jpg, White sand beach File:Santa Rosa Torrey Pine view.JPG, View from the top of Torrey Pines Hill File:Santa rosa cliffs.JPG, The northern part of the island File:Santa rosa island view.JPG, View of the island File:Whale tail.JPG,

Whale watching Whale watching is the practice of observing whales and dolphins ( cetaceans) in their natural habitat. Whale watching is mostly a recreational activity (cf. birdwatching), but it can also serve scientific and/or educational purposes.Hoyt, E. 2 ...

around the island (

humpback whale The humpback whale (''Megaptera novaeangliae'') is a species of baleen whale. It is a rorqual (a member of the family Balaenopteridae) and is the only species in the genus ''Megaptera''. Adults range in length from and weigh up to . The hu ...

) File:Seal at Santa Rosa Island.jpg,

California sea lion The California sea lion (''Zalophus californianus'') is a coastal eared seal native to western North America. It is one of six species of sea lions. Its natural habitat ranges from southeast Alaska to central Mexico, including the Gulf of C ...

(''Zalophus californianus'') by the pier

References

External links

Channel Islands National Park website
—''by the

National Park Service The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...

''.
Santa Cruz Island Foundation: History of Santa Cruz Island
{{authority control Islands of the Channel Islands of California Archaeological sites in California Islands of Santa Barbara County, California Channel Islands National Park Islands of Southern California Islands of California Pre-Clovis archaeological sites in the Americas National Register of Historic Places in Santa Barbara County, California Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in California