Olive
Through the Ages
8000 BC-800
AD | 1769-1869 | 1871-1891
| 1892-1957
| 1958-Present
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| 1769 |
July 28-29: Gaspár
de Portolá, soldiers, and padres cross the Santa Ana River
near present day Olive en route to Monterey,6
on an expedition to secure land in Northern California for Spain
before the Russians could claim these territories for Russia.10 |
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|
| 1771 |
Father Junipero Serra
designates the site along the Santa Ana River near present day Olive
as the location of the fourth California mission. However, after
hostile encounters with local Gabrielinos, Mission San Gabriel
Arcángel is founded many miles northwest instead. The mission
has been at its present site in the San Gabriel Valley since 1774,
a distance of more than 30 miles from Olive. Two years later on
November 1, 1776, Mission San Juan Capistrano, the seventh California
mission, is founded in San Juan Capistrano, Orange County's oldest
city.7 |
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|
| 1776 |
January 7: Juan Bautista
de Anza and his relief party camp on the southern banks of the Santa
Ana River en route to San Diego—from an expedition to found
San Francisco—to suppress a native rebellion in which Father
Luis Jayme of the Mission was murdered. (Source: historical marker
at East Riverdale and Orange-Olive Road) |
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|
| 1801 |
December 8: Retired
career soldier Lieutenant Juan Pablo Grijalva of Sonora, Nueva España
(New Spain)—a Spanish territory that is now a part of Mexico—files
a petition with Lieutenant Manuel Rodriguez, comandante at San Diego,
requesting a large tract of land that included the Olive area. Grijalva
is not given a title to land but is instead granted cattle grazing
rights9
in the areas of Olive, Orange, Villa Park, Tustin, Santa Ana, and
Costa Mesa.8
Together with son-in-law José Antonio Yorba, the two retired
soldiers and their families construct adobe houses there and establish
Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana. The Olive area and surrounding
region is known as "Santa Ana of the Yorbas." Grijalva
would die in June 1806.9 |
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|
| 1810 |
July 1: Governor José
Joaquín de Arrillaga11
grants 62,512 acres of Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana to José
Antonio Yorba and nephew Juan Pablo Peralta—grandson and namesake
of the late Grijalva—after Yorba's son Tomás9
obtains permission for this land from Maria Dolores Valencia, Grijalva's
widow.8
This would be the only Spanish land grant in Orange County.9 |
| |
|
| 1812 |
Circa this time, the
Yorba settlement of Santa Ana Viejo (Old Santa Ana) is founded
below the bend in the Santa Ana River.2
The first adobe is most likely constructed on the lowlands near
the Old Santa Ana fieldstone monument.9 |
| |
|
| 1825 |
January 16: Yorba
dies, survived by his second wife Maria Josefa Valencia (daughter
of Juan Pablo Grijalva); their sons Tomás, José Antonio
II, Bernardo, and Teodocio, and their daughters Isabél, Presentación,
and Raymunda.12
Yorba leaves in his will an adobe house, orchard, vineyard, cattle,
oxen, sheep, and mules. At Santa Ana Viejo Tomás operates
a store, manufactures leather goods and soap, tends to herds of
cattle and sheep, and farms and irrigates the land bordering the
Santa Ana River. He employs a silversmith, shoemaker, cigarmaker,
and hatmaker. Flour is made from grain in the field, and wine and
brandy are produced from vineyard grapes.8
The Santa Ana River overflows, flooding the Olive area.9 |
| |
|
| 1847 |
January 6: Commodore
Robert Stockton, General Stephen Watts Kearny, and 600 men of "the
Army of the West" camp at Olive two days before their victory
against General Andrés Pico and his Californios at
the Battle of San Gabriel. This victory would come after their previous
defeat by the Californios 85 miles south of Olive at San
Pasqual, on December 6, 1846.13
The Battle of San Pasqual, the bloodiest military engagement on
California soil, marked the U.S.'s final defeat in the Mexican War
before all of California would be acquired as a result of the Treaty
of Guadalupe Hidalgo,14
signed on February 2, 1848. The Treaty would also give the U.S.
the land at present-day Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and parts of
Colorado, Nevada, and Utah.15 |
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|
| 1859 |
June 4, 1859 edition
of Los Angeles Star reports that Paul & Chapman are providing
bi-weekly stage coach service via "Los Nietos, Santa Ana [Olive],
San Juan Capistrano, Hot Sulphur Springs, and San Luis Rey."
(OC Historyland article: "Stage
Coach Days in Orange County" by Phil Brigandi, accessed
3/25/2023.) |
| |
|
| 1860 |
Desiderio Burruel,
son-in-law of Teodocio Yorba—the youngest of José Antonio
Yorba's sons—is allotted the land at Olive. The higher land
becomes known as "Burruel Point."16
NOTE: Burruel Point has been identified on maps to this day as being
situated to the east of Santiago Boulevard, where the road runs
north and south. This is not the same Burruel Point location referenced
at this Web site. |
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|
| 1861 |
In this year and in
1862, the Santa Ana River overflows, flooding the Olive area.9 |
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|
| 1863 |
February: Teodocio
Yorba dies12
after suffering a stroke and great financial losses as a result
of the Great Drought of the Sixties that devastated his land and
herds of his livestock.17
With the final remaining offspring of José Antonio Yorba
now gone, the Yorba family's rancho life comes to an end. |
| |
|
| 1868 |
Rancho Santiago
de Santa Ana ceases to exist following a civil suit filed by
100 claimants to the land, questioning the legitimacy of the original
land grant. Among the claimants are pioneers James McFadden, William
Spurgeon, Columbus Tustin, and Alfred Beck Chapman.17
The land at Santa Ana Viejo is sold and a portion of the
area is named the Olive Ranch, possibly for the olive trees planted
in the area by the Yorbas.18
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| |
|
| 1869 |
The settlement of
Santa Ana Viejo loses its name when the present city of Santa
Ana is founded by William Spurgeon, who purchases the land from
Jacob Ross, Sr. Ross had previously purchased the land at present
day Santa Ana from Yorba's descendants.8
Henry Watson, his son Jonathan, and son-in-law John M. Bush purchase
6,000 acres from the Yorbas and establish the Bush Watson ditch
using Teodocio Yorba's old irrigation ditch as a basis.69 |
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