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Ygnacio del Valle, the first
owner of Rancho Camulos.

through 135 editions, was published in most lan-
guages and served as an inspiration for at least four
movies and numerous plays. In the early 19oo's the
Los Angeles Public Library had 29 copies of the book
and a waiting list for readers. 5
The novel and the romanticism it engendered is
credited with awakening interest in things "Spanish"
in southern California and, as a result, the novel
played a part in preserving the Franciscan missions
and countless historical landmarks of the Mexican
era. All this, it seems, grew out of Mrs. Jackson's
impressions of rancho life in the Santa Clara Valley.
But how well did the myth square with the reality?
Camulos in 1883 was one of the few remaining
ranchos still owned and operated by native Califor-
nios. In 1930 the eldest son of the family, Reginaldo
del Valle, wrote a history of his family's homestead. 6
Reginaldo's great grandfather, Antonio, had gotten
the original grant of 11 square leagues from the Mex-
ican government in 1839. He called it Rancho San Mission and vestments given by Bishop Mora; an
Francisco. Reginaldo remembered that the mission account of how the first gold in California was dis-
Indians at the time protested the grant fearing bad covered on the rancho in 1842; and most of all, re-
treatment from their new master. After Antonio's membrances of his mother as a self sacrificing,
death in 1841 the government divided the rancho spiritual advisor to the Indians. Missing from
among the heirs. Reginaldo's father Ygnacio got an Reginaldo's history was how the family had managed
1800 acre parcel and called it Rancho Camulos. In his to hold on to Camulos despite droughts, falling cattle
history Reginaldo neglected to mention that Pedro prices, shyster lawyers, ruinous taxes, prejudicial
Carillo contested Rancho San Francisco's partition in laws and greedy Anglos. Perhaps this was because
1841. Carillo filed an application for a portion of the the Camulos that Helen Hunt Jackson visited in 1883
grant with governor Alvarado. A year later governor and the Camulos that Reginaldo remembered in 1930
Micheltorena ruled in Carillo's favor. The del Valles was in reality the creation of the American era. It
faced a loss of over 17 ,ooo acres when the Mexican bore little resemblance to the arcadian eden of pre-
War broke out in 1846. A final settlement favoring conquest California.
the del Valles came in 1855 by the action of the The del Valle family survived the economic disas-
California Board of Land Commissioners. 7 ters that wiped out other California rancheros by
Reginaldo's history of Camulos mentioned quaint selling off portions of their land and by converting
and romantic details: the custom of burying a dead the rancho from cattle and sheep production to inten-
Indian child in the walls; a description of the family sive industrial farming and viticulture. Before the
chapel furnished with bells from San Fernando Anglo conquest Ygnacio del Valle had acquired Ran-

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