WATSONVILLE — The destiny of the Redman-Hirahara home, as soon as a middle of agriculture in Watsonville, now rests within the arms of the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors.
The board can be voting subsequent month on whether or not to approve a advice by the Santa Cruz County Historic Assets Fee to delist the property from the nationwide Register of Historic Locations and demolish it. Situated on Lee Highway off Freeway 1 close to the Riverside Drive exit, the home has been vacant for the reason that ’80s and has fallen into disrepair, inflicting the county to think about it for demolition.
Historian Sandy Lydon was saddened by the state of affairs however felt it might be troublesome to completely restore the property in its present situation and that federal and state grants can be unlikely within the present local weather.
“I would love to see it saved, but it’s gonna be a heavy lift,” he mentioned.
A storied historical past
The Redman-Hirahara home was inbuilt 1897 for the Redman household who had moved to the Pajaro Valley in 1865 and ran a farm that grew potatoes and sugar beets. Eager to reside in a home that extra resembled metropolis life, the Redmans tapped William Weeks — an architect who constructed a whole bunch of buildings all through California, together with the present Santa Cruz Excessive College campus and the On line casino Arcade on the Santa Cruz Seashore Boardwalk — to construct it. Sitting on 14-acres of farmland, the mansion was constructed in a Queen Anne fashion with ornamental wooden and a rounded-corner turret above Venetian home windows. Patriarch Kendrick Redman lived in the home along with his spouse, Louise, and son, James.
The Redmans grew quite a lot of crops, beginning with sugar beets after Claus Spreckels constructed his processing mill in 1887 after which berries after Ed Reiter and Richard Driscoll launched the fruit to the Pajaro Valley. Among the many many farmworkers have been Japanese migrants.
Nevertheless, the signing of Govt Order 9066 — which forcibly relocated Japanese People to internment camps in retaliation for the Japanese navy’s bombing of Pearl Harbor — resulted within the Hirahara household being moved to a camp in Arkansas. The property was watched over by legal professional John L. McCarthy, who acted as a guardian for Fumio in change of a sum of not more than $50,000 to lease the land for crops, maintenances and bills.
Upon their return, the Hiraharas housed 4 different displaced Japanese American households in a one-story carriage barn on the property.
“Housing was in short supply because the war had used it all up,” mentioned Lydon. “The Hirahara family made it possible for families to use that one-story building as a hostel, a temporary residence until Japanese families could find housing.”
The historic Redman-Hirahara home, which sits off Freeway 1 at Riverside Drive in Watsonville. (Dan Coyro — Santa Cruz Sentinel)
The Redman-Hirahara home as seen from Lee Highway. The home, which was house to 2 distinguished farm households for almost a century, has fallen into disrepair and is being really useful for demolition by the Santa Cruz County Historic Assets Fee. It now heads earlier than the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors for closing motion. (Nick Sestanovich – Santa Cruz Sentinel)
View of the entrance part of the Redman-Hirahara Home when it was being lifted. (Ross Eric Gibson assortment)
Jose Escobar digs a trench across the Redman-Hirahara home in 2007, when it was raised off its basis. The nineteenth century home was then deliberate to be remodeled right into a customer and academic heart for the Pajaro Valley. (Shmuel Thaler — Sentinel file)
The Redman-Hirahara home, seen right here in 2013, was owned by GreenFarm LP, a Menlo Park actual property growth firm till its sale final month. (Shmuel Thaler — Sentinel file)
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The historic Redman-Hirahara home, which sits off Freeway 1 at Riverside Drive in Watsonville. (Dan Coyro — Santa Cruz Sentinel)
Develop
The Hirahara household continued to function the farm till it was bought in 1982 to Palo Alto actual property developer Ryland Kelley, who had additionally developed the close by Pajaro Dunes. Lydon mentioned Kelley supposed to make use of the home as an actual property workplace to promote Pajaro Dunes.
“The building is horribly visible from the freeway, and he could use the house as an attraction: Put some signs on it and fix it up, and then that would then springboard traffic, lure people to go there, turn left on Beach Road and go out to Pajaro Dunes,” he mentioned.
Lydon mentioned Kelley gave a lifetime tenancy to matriarch Tayo, the one Hirahara member of the family who lived there full time by then. She remained on the home till she died in 1986, and the property was declared vacant.
Later woes and restoration efforts
The Redman-Hirahara home was red-tagged after the muse was broken within the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989. Over time, the home grew to become extra dilapidated, however in 1998, a nonprofit referred to as the Redman Basis was shaped to protect and restore the property. A couple of years later, Lydon mentioned the Hirahara household’s title was added, and the group grew to become the Redman-Hirahara Basis.
Lydon, who served as a historic advisor to the muse, mentioned the purpose was to transform the property and the encompassing land into one thing of an academic and cultural heart that might function a focus of the Pajaro Valley’s agricultural historical past whereas directing folks to different historic assets such because the Agricultural Historical past Challenge on the Santa Cruz County Fairgrounds.
“The visibility of the house was so startling from the freeway that we began to develop ideas that we changed over time to use the house as a centerpiece for interpreting the history of the region,” he mentioned.
Lydon mentioned this historical past would have centered on the Pajaro Valley as an agricultural heart and would have had data on the Redman and Hirahara households. He mentioned there have been quite a lot of tales value telling, from Weeks’ standing as a serious participant in native structure to the Redmans making sufficient cash off rising sugar beets to construct the home — amid a serious melancholy, no much less.
“It’s a slam-dunk place to interpret the history of the valley,” he mentioned. “It’s got a wonderful, positive feel to it.”
In 2004, the home was added to the Nationwide Register of Historic Locations, which preserves buildings with historic significance.
Redman-Hirahara Basis members have been capable of raise the two-story construction off its basis to permit for the broken underpinnings to get replaced. Nevertheless, no additional progress was made, because the group filed for chapter in 2009 amid the Nice Recession, and the property went into foreclosures. Watsonville-based firm Elite Agriculture bought the property in 2015.
Present demolition efforts
Per Santa Cruz County Code, full demolitions of historic landmarks are required to go earlier than the Historic Assets Fee for a public listening to after which really useful to go earlier than the Board of Supervisors for closing motion. The fee voted at its Feb. 10 assembly to suggest the board demolish the property and delist it from the Nationwide Register.
A Jan. 5 letter from historic advisor Kent L. Seavey to Santa Cruz County senior coverage planner Matthew Sundt that was included within the fee’s employees report detailed a number of the points with the property, together with a lack of ornamental parts, holes within the partitions, the construction not resting on a basis and no obvious connections to sanitary sewer or septic programs, electrical energy and utilities.
Seavey wrote that the property has been topic to vandalism through the years, poses a fireplace hazard and has been declared uninhabitable by the Santa Cruz County constructing inspector. Moreover, he wrote that the world’s agricultural setting has been compromised by the development of economic properties, together with a Chevron station down the street and a fancy throughout the road with a Hampton Inn, Starbucks and Arco station.
“The National Register designated property should be no longer regarded as an historic resource, because it has lost its historic integrity, both physically and environmentally as constructed in 1897,” Seavey wrote.
Whereas Lydon is saddened by the property’s pending demolition, he felt it could be too far gone to avoid wasting.
“I think we could have done it, say, in 2000 when there was federal money available,” he mentioned. “We just couldn’t get the kind of traction.”
Lydon mentioned the state of affairs is a reminder of the significance of preserving historical past.
“Maybe the current conditions have rendered history a luxury, which is too bad,” he mentioned.
The date for the merchandise to go earlier than the Board of Supervisors is but to be decided.
