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Glenn Price Papers

 Collection — Box: 1
Identifier: MS-16

Scope and Contents

This collection consists of two series: Series 1. Historic Documents and Series 2. Santa Barbara Presidio Materials. Series 1 is a set of forty-eight historic documents from the years 1824-1873. The documents in are mostly related to the period of time when traders were sailing up and down the west coast of North America and to the Hawaiian Islands and mainland China, roughly 1822-1846. They are of a commercial nature--invoices and receipts for supplies and provisions for ships such as the Loriot, Bolivar, Rover, and Rasselas, and letters of debts and accounts. Correspondents include many traders such as Henry Fitch, J.C. Jones, and Jacob Leese. The largest group of documents concerns Alpheus B. Thompson, Santa Barbara resident, merchant, and supercargo of various vessels sailing along the coast. Other items relate to interests in Monterey and Sonoma, such as an 1834 census of soldiers residing there and a list of some Sonoma residents in 1878, both of which can be used to supplement lists of early California pioneers. Additional noteworthy correspondents represented in the collection include Hugo Reid, Pablo de la Guerra, Jacob Snyder, and General Mariano Vallejo. A small unusual group of documents deals with inheritance and land deeds to Prince Jenkins of Falmouth, Massachusetts. Jenkins’ son Foster, was a forty-niner who arrived in California in 1850 from Boston on the bark Orion.

Series 2 consists of correspondence, notes, drawings, Price’s historical resources report, and printed matter about the Santa Barbara Presidio. Supplementary materials include copies of documents about the presidio from the Archives of California at the Bancroft library as well as several blueprints of Santa Barbara City blocks and assessor's parcel maps.

Dates

  • 1788-1959

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is available for research.

Conditions Governing Use

All requests for permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Associate Director for Historic Resources. Permission for publication is given on behalf of the Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation Research Center as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the reader.

Biographical / Historical

Glenn Price is the author of the 1959 historical resources report on the Presidio that provided the background to begin the reconstruction project that still continues today. On July 9, 1957, California Senate Bill 2653 was passed which gave the Division of Beaches and Parks the authority to conduct a feasibility study of the acquisition and development of the Presidio. Price, a historian and park ranger at Will Rogers State Historic Park at the time, undertook the study in close cooperation with Pearl Chase. During that effort, Price amassed a collection of research materials, including documents from the Bancroft Library, historical background material collected by Chase, and photographs of the Presidio neighborhood. These materials, along with correspondence to Chase and others, form part of this collection of papers. Glenn Price was awarded the Pearl Chase Preservation Award by the Santa Barbara Trust for Historic Preservation in 2009.

Extent

.5 Linear Feet

Language of Materials

English

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Gift of Glenn Price. The documents were a gift to Price from his friend Don McGill, also a historian and book collector, who gave his large collection of books on southwest history to California State University at Northridge.

Related Materials

Copies of the complete report The Santa Barbara Presidio, by Glenn W. Price (January, 1959) and several shorter versions are located in the vertical files at the Presidio Research Center. Photographs and plans that accompanied the original report are located in the Trust Institutional Records.

Separated Materials

Several issues of the San Diego Weekly Bulletin and the San Diego Union from 1870-1871 were transferred to the library collection.

Creator

Source

Title
Glenn Price Papers
Status
Completed
Language of description
Undetermined
Script of description
Code for undetermined script

Repository Details

Part of the Presidio Research Center Repository

Contact:
215 East Canon Perdido St.
Santa Barbara CA 93101 USA
(805) 961-5369