Tapia Adobe (Site of)

Tiburcio Tapia was an ex-soldier, a Los Angeles merchant and an alcalde, and in 1839 the governor handed him thirteen thousand acres. He put a large adobe on Red Hill half a mile west of here, and the register says plainly that he employed Indian labourers to build it, which is more than most plaques of this vintage manage. His heirs sold the rancho in 1858, the house was abandoned, and it dissolved back into the ground it was dug from.

What the plaque says

In 1839 Governor Juan Alvarado granted the 13,000 acre tract called Cucamonga to Tiburcio Tapia, an ex-soldier who was a prominent merchant and alcalde in Los Angeles. A half mile west of this marker, Tapia, employing Indian laborers, inmediately built an adobe house on a vantage point on Red Hill. The large adobe was abandoned in 1858 when Tapia's heirs sold the rancho. The adobe soon disintegrated into its native earth. This marker is located on land which once was a part of Tapia's rancho.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Graber Olive House — 2.9 mi
  The oldest business in Ontario, a cannery of five hundred brine vats — shut since the pandemic and in foreclosure.
• Kaiser Steel Mill Site — 6.4 mi
  The mill that made Fontana a steel town, gave the country Kaiser Permanente, and drew a color line at Base Line Road.
• Planes of Fame Air Museum — 8.8 mi
  On the field where the country smelted its surplus warplanes — and about thirty of the aircraft here still fly.
• Wigwam Motel — 15 mi
  Nineteen concrete teepees on Foothill Boulevard, the last of Frank Redford's Wigwam Villages and still renting rooms.

More markers nearby

• Cucamonga Rancho Winery — steps away
• Madonna of the Trail — 2.3 mi
• Adobe de Palomares — 7.6 mi
• Pomona Water Powerplant — 8.2 mi