Historic Rancho Los Alamitos Grandly Reopens

Some 1,500 years of local history - from Native American to Spanish and Mexican ownership to Depression-era American ranch - will once again be treasured atop a Long Beach hill with Sunday's grand reopening of Rancho Los Alamitos.

After an extensive rebuilding project, the historic Rancho Los Alamitos’s open house party from noon to 5 p.m. will showcase the blending of old and more modern periods of the property's inhabitants. The Bixby family was the last to own the homestead where you can still see clear to Los Angeles on a clear day.

Entitled, Living History for All Time, the Sunday event will also feature performances by Intertribal Bird Singers, Paso de Oro Dance Company, El Mariachi Zacatecas, The Shanty Man Bill Dempsey, California Cowboy Band and the International Peace Choir, according to the website.

Demonstrations and storytellers will depict the diverse cultural traditions of different peoples who called the area home during its long history, including the Gabrielino-Tongva tribe, and Spanish and Mexican settlers.

The site will also feature a learning center, an adobe ranch home from the 1800s, gardens circa 1920s-1930s, and a barns area with five revitalized structures once again housing animals like chickens, horses, rabbits and goats, according to a statement.

The entire restoration is based on an aerial photograph taken in 1948, and a barn from that same year has been used as the base for the new Rancho Center, according to the Ranchos Los Alamitos web site.

Those wishing to visit the Rancho Center and Barns Area for an informative first-person narrative are required to make reservations upon arrival as space is limited.

Still considered a sacred space by the Gabrielino-Tongva tribe, which called it Povuu’ngna, the ranch consists of 7.5 acres in the center of Long Beach.

The remainder of nearly 30,000 acres given to Manuel Nieto by Spanish rulers in 1790, Ranchos Los Alamitos was owned by a governor, oil company and, finally, the Bixby family, which gave it to the city of Long Beach in 1968, according to the Ranch Los Alamitos web site.

Now listed in the National Register of Historic Places, Ranchos Los Alamitos has been a source of inspiration for many of its visitors, including two-time pulitzer-nominated classical musician and USC music professor, Robert Cummings.

He was so taken with a trip he took to Ranchos Los Alamitos that he composed the Suite for Double String Orchestra in honor of its stunning scenery and hisorical significance, according to the Long Beach Symphony Orchestra's web site

“I was so inspired by the ambience and timeless spirit of Rancho Los Alamitos that I had to capture it through music,” Cummings said on the site. “With this suite, I wanted to reaffirm that profound feeling of being in a place that embodies a seamless continuum between the past, present and future.” 

The ranch is located located at 6400 Bixby Hill Road, Long Beach, CA 90802. Shuttle service will be offered during the grand opening to and from free parking located at CSULB Lot 11 on Palo Verde Avenue.

Currently closed until the upcoming grand opening celebration, the grounds will subsequently be open to the public from 1 p.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday.

The grand opening is free and will take place from noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. For more information, click here.