Chaucer's Books will host university professor and author Colleen M. Delaney for an in-store book talk and signing on Thursday, June 9 at 6 p.m.
Journey through five thousand years of community and lifeways that shaped Santa Barbara and Ventura Counties.
Today, the name Guadalasca is most commonly associated with a mountain biking trail in Point Mugu State Park, but its history goes much deeper. A Mexican land grant awarded in 1836, Rancho Guadalasca lay at the western end of the Santa Monica Mountains along the eastern Oxnard Plain. Santa Barbara resident and grantee Ysabel Yorba, an illiterate widow, successfully managed the ranch for more than 35 years. She is just one of many fascinating people who once lived along this stretch of the Central Coast. Indigenous Chumash, Californio ranchers, Anglo American farmers, Japanese fishermen, and Basque sheepherders all left their marks on the land, along with local institutions like Camarillo State Hospital and CSU Channel Islands.
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