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For Immediate Release Iconic Southern California Landmark Rancho Los Alamitos to Open New Rancho Center, Restored Historic

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For Immediate Release Iconic Southern California Landmark Rancho Los Alamitos to Open New Rancho Center, Restored Historic FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Media Contacts: Rachel Bauch Ruder Finn Arts & Communications Counselors [email protected] / 310.882.4013 Daniel Harju Ruder Finn Arts & Communications Counselors [email protected] / 310.552.4181 ICONIC SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA LANDMARK RANCHO LOS ALAMITOS TO OPEN NEW RANCHO CENTER, RESTORED HISTORIC BARN STRUCTURES AND GARDENS The June 10, 2012, Grand Opening is a culmination of the historic site’s comprehensive restoration and preservation process— marking a new chapter in experiences at Rancho Los Alamitos Bixby Hill, Long Beach, January 24—On June 10, 2012, Rancho Los Alamitos, Povuu’ngna—a sacred site that represents the past, present and future of California— will open to the public its new Rancho Center and restored historic Barns Area. As the centerpiece of Rancho Los Alamitos’ long-term transformation, the Rancho Center project will present engaging new ways of connecting with the diverse voices and stories that shaped this uniquely California site and reflect the ongoing blend of regional culture and environment, including the Native American, Spanish, and Mexican periods, the ranching and farming era, and the imprint of early 20th century development upon the landscape. The Grand Opening Year will invite visitors to experience the reinvigorated site in a new light through the Rancho Center’s permanent exhibition and learning spaces. An array of new public programs and symposia—will provide a one-of-a-kind vantage point from which to connect with the powerful story of California, its landscape and inhabitants throughout time, reviewing its past, present and future possibilities. “The opening of the Rancho Center and restored historic Barns represents the completion of our thoughtful and comprehensive renewal, a hugely important step in our ongoing efforts to preserve Rancho Los Alamitos for future generations,” said Pamela Seager, Rancho Los Alamitos Executive Director. “ Located on Bixby Hill in the heart of urban Long Beach, the 7.5-acre Rancho Los Alamitos is twice listed in the National Register of Historic Places: once for its early incarnation as ancestral Povuu’ngna, the traditional birthplace of the native Tongva people of the Los Angeles Basin and once for the significant evolution of its historic landscape from the time of the Spanish/Mexican and early American eras through the working ranch of the early-to-mid-twentieth century—a larger regional cultural shift that the ranch so vividly exemplifies. Today, the ranch continues to be an authentic oasis of natural beauty and a place where people connect with the landscape and history of the region in emotional and visceral ways. What’s New: At the heart of the ambitious transformation about to be completed is Rancho Los Alamitos’ commitment to public education and historic preservation, both of which will be greatly aided by the creation of the new Rancho Center and a complete restoration of the historic Barns Area. The restoration of the Barns Area included relocating and restoring five agricultural structures to recapture the layout and character of the historic working Ranch. Exhibiting a stunning blend of historic and contemporary architecture and using the 1948 horse barn as the historic core for the new larger structure, the Rancho Center was designed by the renowned historic preservation firm, Architectural Resources Group, FAIA, in San Francisco. “In a distinctively reversed order, the Rancho Center architectural design was developed around the content of the permanent exhibition, letting the ideas form the space and resulting in an authentic experience in line with the overall ethos of Rancho Los Alamitos,” stated lead project architect Stephen J. Farneth, co-founder of ARG. The Rancho Center will house the innovative permanent exhibition Rancho Los Alamitos—Ever Changing, Always the Same, designed by William S. Wells and Claudia Jurmain. The interwoven themes of “Renewing Possibilities,” “Natives and Newcomers,” and “Borders and Boundaries” extend through the exhibition, which stretches across multiple spaces within the Center and directed the design of the building. The History Room and video feature the Rancho’s untapped archive of original source materials: ledgers, letters and oral histories to tell the stories of those who lived and worked there over time: Indian workers, Belgian tenant farmers, Chinese immigrants, Mexican ranch hand families, and Japanese lease farmers. The names and nicknames written in John Bixby’s 19th century ledgers— Augustine Old Basque, Old Charlie Swede, Black Frenchman, John Italian, Old Irishman, Manuel Portuguese, Old Glory Mexican, Foolish Boy, George Big Dutchman, Ah Yoon, Ah Fan, Chiyo Kawanami Ohira, and Tom Elliot Texas herder are just one snapshot of the diverse rancho community. 2 The floor map of the multi-purpose Rancho Room displays the changing borders of the Rancho within the regional context, past and present, while magnificent large-scale watercolor murals by the late renowned illustrator and graphic designer, Dugald Stermer, cover the Rancho Room’s walls and convey the relation between people and place, climate, and the vital role of water. A separate gift store and classroom building will provide additional spaces for special educational programs developed in relation to the site and the Rancho Center exhibition. In its service to over 25,000 yearly visitors, the Rancho Los Alamitos site itself, along with educational tours, and special programs set the stage for new understandings of cultural ecology—of the intertwined paths of people, resources, flora and fauna over time. The use of geo-thermal technology supports the heating and air conditioning systems of the Rancho Center and the Bookshop/Classroom, minimizing the ecological footprint of the new structures and preserving the tranquility of the site. The geo-thermal project involved installing 22,000 vertical feet of piping in thirty bores, each extending to 350 feet below the ground. The piping is filled with water and the earth’s constant temperature of 68 degrees is used to keep the water coming into and out of the building’s heating and air conditioning systems at that temperature, thus requiring the use of very little energy for heating and cooling. It is but one example of RLA’s conservationist ethos and is the first historic site on the West Coast to adopt this green technology. “Investing in a geothermal system was not only in line with the ecological conservationist ethos that Rancho Los Alamitos conveys, it also avoided the visual and audible intrusion of cooling towers, fans and the need for a boiler room on an historic site,” said Pamela Seager, Rancho Los Alamitos Executive Director. A History of Rancho Los Alamitos - Southern California Microcosm: The story of Rancho Los Alamitos begins long before the Bixby family donated the family ranch to the City of Long Beach in 1968, transforming what had been a working ranch to a public oasis and setting the stage for what Rancho Los Alamitos is today. Water, land for agriculture, oil wealth, and open green space each appeared at the right time to support communities who sustained themselves and each other through the Rancho’s resources. Today, as a publicly owned ranch with an emphasis on education, the historic open green space of Rancho Los Alamitos has become a quintessential place for people to experience the living and breathing story of Southern California. Rancho Los Alamitos—its inhabitants and landscape—is a microcosm that illustrates the cultural and ecological evolution of the entire region, past to present. With key themes such as resilience, renewal, diversity and hard change reverberating throughout its history, the story of Rancho Los Alamitos begins around 500 AD, when the land was home to the native Tongva people, who called the hill site village Povuu’ngna, a sacred land of creation with nearby natural springs, on which they gathered for trade and ceremony. For Spanish soldier Manuel Nieto in 1790, the land that included what would become Rancho Los Alamitos—a name taken from the small Cottonwood trees that grew plentifully in groves nourished by nearby natural springs—was a ranching gem amassed for service paid to the Spanish Crown. Subsequent owners Governor José Figueroa and Yankee Don Abel Stearns saw the site as a smart investment and a haven away from Los Angeles. And to three generations of the Bixby family, the ranch’s last private owners, and the workers and tenant farmers from around the globe who worked there, Rancho Los Alamitos was an enterprising ranch that would endure for almost a century through the rise of modern-day Long Beach. 3 The Historic Gardens: Rancho Los Alamitos’s four acres of historic gardens are a key feature that makes Rancho Los Alamitos such an invigorating experience for visitors. Elegantly designed and matured by the grace of time, the 1920s and 1930s gardens invite visitors to meander among displays of exotic and native flora and be lulled away to a place where time slows down and inspiration happens. The theme of “Natives and Newcomers” not only describes inhabitants and laborers at Rancho Los Alamitos, but is directly tied to the vegetation, including native wildlife and additions to the landscape made by successive stewards of the property. While some of the gardens were designed by the iconic Olmsted Brothers Firm, all of the historic gardens hold special significance as they were born from the particular vision of Florence Bixby, who often sought to create a spiritual refuge for herself as well as the
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