City of Ventura
Ventura County California
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Ventura is one of the most charming communities found along California's coastline. As a coastal city Ventura is a friendly, diverse and unique community which is rich in history, culture, charm and character.
Ventura, the getaway to the Channel Islands National Park, is a classic Southern California beach town offering the services and amenities that make living here a unique experience.
Located an easy one-hour drive north of Los Angeles, Ventura offers you city living with a small town feeling.
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The Ventura Beach Communities are by far some of the most desired real estate in California where you can find Ocean Front homes, Water Front homes, Beach homes and Beach town homes. Here you can park your boat directly in front of your water front home with easy access to the Pacific Ocean by way of the adjoining Harbor and Pierpont Bay. Along Pierpont Drive you will find some 30 short streets each ending at the Ventura Beach. These streets are lined with beach homes ranging in price from $800,000 to well over $2,000,000 for homes directly on the sand. There are usually no more than 5 to 10 homes for sale in the area at any given time.
Leaving the city of Ventura and traveling up Interstate 101 and Highway 1 towards Santa Barbara you find five more beach home communities. They are Solimar Beach, Faria Beach, Rincon Beach, Mussel Shoals and North beach. In these areas homes range from $800,000 to over $3,000,000 for homes directly facing the water.
In the hills above the city you will find residential neighborhoods where many of the homes have ocean views. Below the hills near the downtown areas from California Street to Mills Street is residential neighborhoods rich in the older culture of Ventura where you can find Craftsman style, unique cottages and quaint Spanish bungalows.
From Mills Road eastward there are many fine residential areas featuring more traditional homes.
Its warm climate and seaside location makes Ventura a popular tourist spot and a great place to live. The city welcomes well over a million visitors a year and tourism is its major industry. High tech firms are also moving into the area. Ventura manages its growth and so still has acres of orchards and fields, hillsides and clean, clear waves. There is also a very active downtown area and many choices of housing- from condominiums to large homes.
City of Ventura Heritage
History buffs will love Ventura. The city is home to the ninth California mission-Mission San Buenaventura, founded in 1782 by Father Junipero Serra and now beautifully restored. The Ventura County Museum of History displays on the lives of the Chumash Indians, Spanish explorers and early Ventura settlers are also of interest.
Mission San Buenaventura, named for Saint Bonaventure, was the most successful and influential of the California Missions founded by Father Junipero Serra. Following the great earthquake of 1812-13, the Mission lands were divided up among the settlers. Administrators were appointed to transfer such lands to private property owners and to proceed with secular development of the county.
In 1841 the Rancho San Miguel was deeded to Raimundo Olivas, who built the most magnificent hacienda south of Monterey on the banks of the Santa Clara River. Along with the Old Mission, this building, the Olivas Adobe, is part of Ventura's historic past, and has been restored and refurnished as a splendid example of early California life.
Settlers came in after the Civil War, buying land from the Mexicans or simply squatting on property. Vast holdings were later acquired by Easterners, including the railroad magnate, Thomas Scott. He was impressed by one of the young employees, Thomas R. Bard, who had been in charge of train supplies to Union Troops, and Bard was sent west to handle Scott's property.
Bard is often regarded as the Father of Ventura and his descendants have been prominently identified with the growth of Ventura County. The Union Oil Company was organized with Bard as President in 1890, and has offices in Santa Paula. The main Ventura oil field was drilled in 1914 and at its peak produced 90,000 barrels a day.
For most of its history, Ventura has escaped the thrust of immigrating people, and has been able to enjoy its own more leisurely, less crowded way of life. At the same time, Ventura became prosperous. The city is located between two richly endowed valleys, the Ventura River and the Santa Clara River, and so rich was the soil that citrus grew better here than anywhere else in the state. The growers along these rivers got together and formed Sunkist, the world's largest organization of citrus production.
Until the completion of the Ventura Freeway from Los Angeles to Ventura - the last link finished in 1969 - travel by auto was slow and hazardous. For most of the century which followed the incorporation of Ventura in 1866, it was pretty much isolated from the southern part of the State.
Even from the north, entrance was by way of a single road along the beach and stage coach passengers either had to wait until low tide when the horses could cross on the exposed wet sand, or go up the Ventura River Valley and then cross over the mountains to Santa Barbara via Casitas Pass, always a long and difficult trip. Inland, Ventura was hemmed in by the Los Padres National Forest, composed of mountainous country, deep canyons, and peaks that rise as high as 8,831 feet, namely Mt. Pinos. Thus Ventura was isolated in that direction also, until a narrow road, the Maricopa Highway, was built in the 1920's.
Ventura has grown steadily ever since. In 1920 there were 4,156 people. In 1930 the population had increased to 11,603, and by 1950 the population reached 16,643. In the last two decades it has quadrupled to approximately 102,000.