Historical Marker · No. 940

Rancho Guajome

Vista, San Diego County · California
Erected by State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with the San Diego County Department of Parks and Recreation and Squibob Chapter, E Clampus Vitus, April 26, 1981, 1981

The plaque names Stearns, Bandini and Couts and calls the first two owners two mission Indians. They were Andrés and José Manuel, Payómkawichum brothers granted the rancho by Pío Pico in 1845, and they sold within a few years. Couts, whom the bronze styles Colonel, was appointed federal sub-agent for the Payómkawichum in 1853 and used their labor on his own properties. Three hundred of them made the adobe bricks the plaque admires. He was tried for murder and acquitted.

What the plaque says

Rancho Guajome Formerly attached to Mission San Luis Rey, the 2,219 acre ranch passed through brief ownership by two mission Indians, then Don Abel Stearns, and into possession of Ysidora Bandini upon marriage to Col. Cave Johnson Couts. The adobe ranch house, built in 1852-53, is one of the finest extant examples of the traditional Spanish-Mexican one-story hacienda with an inner-outer courtyard plan. It was acquired by San Diego County in 1973 for the Guajome Regional Park. California Registered Historical Landmark No. 940 Plaque placed by the State Department of Parks and Recreation in cooperation with the San Diego County Department of Parks and Recreation and Squibob Chapter, E Clampus Vitus, April 26, 1981.

Where it stands

33.23325, -117.25369 · Directions

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