Names on the Signs in Santa Cruz: The County

As mentioned previously, Santa Cruz County was created in 1850. Elections followed shortly thereafter, and the first County officers took up their duties in 1852. Then, as now, getting elected was a sign that a person had achieved a certain level of recognition and reputation in the minds of fellow citizens.

So it’s interesting to look back at those names. Not surprisingly, they were all men who arrived here during the 1840’s (Californios need not apply). Many of the names are already familiar to readers of this blog: Joseph L. Majors, William Blackburn, Elihu Anthony, John Daubenbiss, John Hames, Eli Moore.

We met William Blackburn previously as a California Battalion veteran and potato farmer, but history remembers him mainly as Judge Blackburn. After his military service and prior to his farming career, Blackburn was appointed alcalde in 1847, during the California Territory period.

The office of alcalde was a holdover from the Spanish-style government, and was a combination of administrator and judge. Blackburn became known as a dispenser of swift, decisive and sometimes Solomonic judgments.

The alcalde’s offices were in the juzgado, a 2 1/2-story adobe structure located where Holy Cross Elementary School stands today. Fans of old western movies will recognize the westernized version of the Spanish word: hoosegow (used to refer to a jail). Santa Cruzans apparently liked Blackburn's judicial style, for they elected him as the first County judge in 1850.

One of the first County Supervisors, Eli Moore also deserves a little more attention. According to Clark, he was a native of Missouri who arrived here in 1847 and bought some Rancho Refugio land from Jose Bolcoff. Before long, however, Moore moved into town, building a log house that became only the second building (following Anthony's shop) in today’s downtown Santa Cruz.

Moore later built a wood-frame house farther down Pacific. His family later donated the first property to the City to form part of the site for the County's first courthouse, built in 1866. At some time during this period, Moore briefly partnered with Bolcoff to operate the old Mission grist mill on Santa Cruz Creek (the Babbling Brook Inn location).

Today’s Moore Creek flows through the old ranch, and some of the ranch land has become the Moore Creek Preserve, part of the city’s greenbelt. There’s also a Moore Street, one block over from Majors Street in the Westlake neighborhood. I’ve found no evidence that Eli Moore ever lived in this area, so perhaps it was named for a descendent or a different Moore.

Another of the first Supervisors was a man not yet mentioned: Moses A. Meder. Meder’s story is an interesting one. A native of New Hampshire, he arrived in Yerba Buena (San Francisco) on the ship Brooklyn in 1846 as part of the first group of Mormon settlers in California.

Instead of staying with the group, however, Meder struck out on his own, ending up in Santa Cruz in 1847. He worked at Isaac Graham’s Zayante Creek sawmill for a while, and then built a new mill for Graham nearby on the San Lorenzo River. He profited enough from these labors to buy some land from Bolcoff, adjoining Moore’s ranch. Today’s Meder Street runs through the area. Appropriately, one entrance to the Moore Creek Preserve is from the west end of Meder Street.

Meder was apparently a man of honesty and integrity. One story tells how the first County Treasurer, Joseph Majors, faced a dilemma because the new county had no bank or other safe place to keep county funds. Majors’ solution was to ask his friend Meder to keep the money in a trunk under his bed.

Another interesting part of Meder’s story is that, late in his life, he donated land for a Jewish cemetery, on the condition that his family be given a burial plot in it (Meder himself is not buried there, so perhaps the land gift was part of his will). According to Temple Beth El, Meder was not Jewish, so this act of generosity is curious. Meder’s earlier desertion of the Mormon settler party seems to indicate that he was not a strong Mormon, either, so his religious affiliation remains a mystery.