Santa Barbara County History

Transcribed by Peggy Hooper

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Source:
A Memorial and Biographical History of the Counties of Santa Barbara,
San Luis Obispo, and Ventura, California
by Yda Addis Storke
Published in 1891 in Chicago by the Lewis Publishing Co.


MINERALS. 
(From the State Mineralogical Report.) 

On the San Marcos Rancho there is said to be a lode that assays well in both gold and silver. 
Gold-bearing rock has also been found on the Buel Rancho, near Los Alamos. Placer claims 
have been worked at Pine Mountain, also at the headwaters of Zaca Creek, and at several 
places in the San Rafael Mountains. A very few colors of gold are occasionally found in the 
creeks running from the Santa Ynes Range. Gold-washing has also been carried on upon the 
seashore; the most successful operations were at Point Sal, in the northwestern corner of 
the county. Point Sal is situated upon the southern bank of the Santa Maria River. Gold-washing 
has been intermittently carried on here by the Point Sal Mining Company. The gold is found 
in streaks of black sand from three to four feet below the surface of the beach. They run from 
one inch to two feet in thickness, usually being about one foot, and from thirty to forty feet 
in length. The bank of the beach runs north and south, the streaks of sand east and west 
toward the ocean. Beneath the black sand is blue clay in some places, and sandstone in others. 
The richest deposits are found on the sandstone where it is worn into ridges, being favorable 
to the concentration of the gold. The sand is run into a hopper, where a stream of water 
carries it over amalgamated plates. About twenty-five tons of this sand yielded $137. 

On the Jontla Rancho, near Los Alamos, rock containing gold and silver has been found. This 
at last induced William Buel to explore the formation of his rancho by running a tunnel over 
400 feet. This tunnel, which is situated a little over 1,000 feet above the level of the sea, is 
run in a southwesterly direction through a sedimentary formation, which dips to the sea at 
an angle of about 45� * * * Here and there throughout the tunnel are a few seams and 
pockets of clayey matter, which are said to show a few colors of gold. * * * The tunnel does 
not appear to be following any vein. 

Copper is said to exist in paying quantities on the southern bank of the Santa Cruz River, 
where it was worked by the old padres; also at several places in the San Rafael Mountains. 

Quicksilver is said to exist at Los Prietos, nine miles north of Santa Barbara, on the upper 
waters of the Santa Ynes River, in considerable quantities. It is claimed that a great deal 
of the ore will average from two to three per cent. The Eagle Quicksilver mine was also 
worked in 1867, by Captain Samuel Stanton, on the Cuchama River, in the San Rafael 
Mountains. 

Float rock containing galena is said to be found at the mouth of Dry Creek Canon, on the 
Buel Rancho, near Los Alamos; also on the Spinnocia Rancho, about twelve miles east of 
Santa Ynes, in the San Rafael Mountains. 

Manganese occurs in the San Rafael Mountains, about seven miles north of the town of 
Santa Ynes. 

Coal has been found at several places in Santa Barbara County, notably in the Loma 
Paloma, head of Santa Ynes Creek, Montecito Hot Springs and at the Mission. 

Limestone is widely distributed in the county, but as yet has been burned only for local 
use. It is found upon Moore's Rancho, a few miles west of Santa Barbara. Immediately 
north of Mr. Moore's house, distant about two miles from the seashore, are the foothills 
of the Santa Ynes Range, spurs of which run down nearly to the water's edge; these are 
composed of sandstone, varying from coarse to fine. At one point they are traversed by 
a vein of calcite about four feet wide, running nearly east and west. 

The gypsum deposits of Santa Barbara occur upon the southern side of Point Sal, and 
can be reached by road either from Guadalupe or Santa Maria. Point Sal gypsum mines 
lie back in the mountains about one and one-half miles from Point Sal Landing. They 
occur as a vein having a head-wall and foot-wall of clay slate. There are six openings on 
this property from which gypsum are taken. * * * The finest quality of the material is 
said to be obtained in the upper workings. The other openings are of less importance, 
and no gypsum at present is taken from them. The lower vein can be traced for about 
two miles. This mineral can be mined and placed on board the vessels at Point Sal for 
about $2 per ton. 

There are several mineral springs in this county, but few of them have as yet become 
places of resort. At Montecito the water from the springs reaches 117� Fahrenheit. 
On the Santa Ynes Mountains, near Santa Barbara, there is another hot spring; also 
in the Santa Marcos Canon, where the water is said to reach a temperature of 130� 
Fahrenheit. In the canon and the Cuyama Valley are also springs. 

There are, so far as known at the present time, no oil wells producing anything in 
Santa Barbara County, though several have been sunk there. But there are great 
deposits of asphaltum and other bituminous matters at several localities in the 
county. " El Rincon " Creek, some three or four miles east of Carpenteria, is, for 
some little distance near the coast, the boundary line between Ventura and Santa 
Barbara counties. At Rincon Point, on the shore just west of El Rincon Creek, the 
railway company has recently done some heavy grading in the construction of 
their road. Amongst other unaltered rocks here, which dip toward the north, they 
have cut through a heavy body of bituminous shales, which contain a sufficient 
quantity of bituminous matter, so that, when once ignited they continue to burn 
for a long time like the waste heaps from a coal mine. 

The Rancho of Mr. P. Clark Higgins, mentioned as the "Carpenteria bed," is only 
about one mile east of the new Carpenteria railway station. The bluffs here fronting 
the sea-beach are fifty to seventy-five feet high. The lower portion of them consists 
of tertiary rocks, out of which the petroleum oozes. * * * Anywhere within one 
quarter of a mile or more back from the edge of the bluffs it is no uncommon 
occurrence for the plow to turn up bituminous matter. * * * 

The outcrop of asphaltum and other bituminous matters in the bluffs extends for 
a distance of three-quarters of a mile along the shore and to within half a mile or 
less of the new railway station at Carpenteria. * * * This bitumen is very dirty, but 
might possibly be used for street pavements. 

On Ortega Hill, about six miles east of Santa Barbara, and near half way between 
there and Carpenteria, Mr. H. L. Williams has drilled a well. The locality is within
500 or 600 feet of the seashore, and 250 feet above high tide. Mr. Williams here 
went down 455 feet. * * * The shale is very close, and contains neither water nor 
oil. The sand above was free from water. But the oil which it contains makes it act 
like a quicksand, and it rose 100 feet in the pipe. * * * In attempting to draw the 
casing, in order to substitute drive pipe for it, the casing parted in the upper sand 
and they could not get the lower part of it out, and were therefore obliged to 
abandon the hole. Then they swung the derrick around about ten feet, and started 
another one. 

Just northwest of Ortega Hill, in the Montecito Valley, two little creeks join, and 
just below their junction there is a small outcrop of asphaltum in the bank. * * * 

At the foot of the hills, on the shore, a quarter of a mile east of the well, the rocks 
are exposed at low water, and it looks as if there were an anticlinal fold here. There 
is also some seepage of oil from these rocks, and Mr. Williams states that after a 
slight earthquake shock one night, in 1883, a jet of oil "as large as a man's arm " 
spurted out here for a little while, but did not last long. Considerable gas also 
escapes from these rocks. Their strike is about east and west. Mr. Williams' wells 
are just about on the line of the anticlinal axis in these rocks, while the old well at 
the foot of the hill is on the north side of it. 

A little over one mile east of here a low bluff makes out a short distance into the 
sea, and there is also some seepage of oil. There are also said to be extensive 
seepages in "Oil Canon " and one other canon in the Sauia? Ynes range of mountains, 
some three miles in an airline northeast from Ortega Hill. 

In 1885 the "Santa Barbara Oil Company" sunk two wells some 500 or 600 feet 
deep in " Oil Canon," at a point 1,400 or 1,500 feet above tide. There was much 
gas here. But at last, either by accident or malice, the tools were lost in one of 
the wells, and the work was abandoned. * * * 

Moore's Lauding is near the village of Goleta, about seven miles west of the city 
of Santa Barbara. Easterly from the landing, for a distance of a mile of so along 
the shore, the bluffs are forty to seventy-five feet high, of light gray sandstone, 
* * in which there are enormous quantities of asphaltum, which occur in all 
imaginable forms. There are occasional well-defined veins of it, from the thickness 
of a sheet of paper up to two or three feet thick, which extend for short distances 
through the heavy-bedded sandstone, and then run out completely. Again it occurs 
in heavy masses twenty or thirty feet and more in diameter. In some places very 
heavy beds of it run nearly parallel with the stratification of the sandstone, while 
on the other hand many of the small veins of it cut straight through and across 
the bedding at all angles. Most of it is largely mixed with sand and pebbles; but 
there are large quantities of it which look very pure. No liquid oil is visible here, 
nor any soft pitch either, except what is washed up in small flakes by the surf on
 the beach from beneath the waters of the sea. 

Something like a mile to the west of the landing there is a place in a creek in the 
salt marsh where a good deal of gas bubbles up ; and two or three miles farther 
southwest is Salinas Point, which projects some distance into the sea, and about 
half a mile outside of which is one of the large and famous petroleum springs 
beneath the ocean. The depth of the water where this spring issues was asserted 
by one man to be only about fifty feet, but by another to be fifty fathoms. The 
latter is more probable. About eighteen miles off shore here in the channel, and 
some two miles north of the island of Santa Cruz there is also said to be another 
very large oil spring under the water. 

Mr. H. C. Hobson, of San Luis Obispo, states that there are very large quantities 
of asphaltum on the Sisquoc Rancho, in the northern part of Santa Barbara 
County, on one of the upper branches of the Santa Maria River. Sisquoc Creek 
joins the Santa Maria River at Fugler's Point, some fifty miles south of San Luis Obispo.