{"id":457277,"date":"2026-09-08T15:26:22","date_gmt":"2026-09-08T15:26:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/457277\/"},"modified":"2026-09-08T15:26:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-08T15:26:22","slug":"think-you-know-san-onofre-bet-you-didnt-know-it-once-had-a-village","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/457277\/","title":{"rendered":"Think you know San Onofre? Bet you didn\u2019t know it once had a village"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Aerial photo of San Onofre, ca. 1940. (Photo from author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.)<\/p>\n

The name San Onofre is familiar to generations of Southern Californians. It brings to mind a long stretch of coastline, surfing, camping and the distinctive domes of the nuclear power plant.<\/p>\n

But San Onofre once had something else: a village.<\/p>\n

The community took shape around the San Onofre railroad station and the enormous ranching operation that surrounded it. For decades, people lived, worked and raised families in an isolated corner of northern San Diego County that bore little resemblance to the developed coastline people know today.<\/p>\n

The history of that vanished community has been documented in the Journal of San Diego History in an article titled \u201cRemembering the Forgotten Village of San Onofre: An Untold Story of Race Relations.\u201d<\/a> Written by historian Ryan Jordan, the article draws on historical records and recollections from people who lived and worked in the area.<\/p>\n

San Onofre\u2019s connection to the railroad dates to 1888, when the Santa Fe railroad <\/a>built a depot there to help transport cattle, livestock and crops to market.<\/p>\n

The railroad was essential to the community.<\/p>\n

San Onofre\u2019s location was remote, but the depot connected the ranching area with other Southern California communities. The surrounding Rancho Santa Margarita was a major cattle operation, and annual cattle roundups and rodeos at San Onofre attracted hundreds of cattle buyers from throughout the Southwest.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>An old car among the sycamore or oak trees along San Onofre Creek c. 1906.(Photo from author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.)<\/p>\n

Residents also remembered the bunkhouses used by cowboys a couple of miles from the train station.<\/p>\n

In 1916, San Onofre even briefly became a movie set. Jerome O\u2019Neill allowed a film crew to use the San Onofre corral for an unnamed film with silent screen star Roy Stewart<\/a>. A photograph showing O\u2019Neill and the crew is described in the journal article as probably the oldest known photograph of the area, Jordan wrote.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>This 1916 San Onofre corral photo comes from the book \u201cRancho Santa Margarita Remembered\u201d by Jerome W. Baumgartner. It is on p. 131. Jerome\u2019s father, also named Jerome, indicated that the man second from the left with his thumbs in his pocket was Roy Stewart, a well-known silent film actor. (Photo and caption info courtesy of author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.)<\/p>\n

The area was also home to Hispanic and Japanese American residents<\/a>, including agricultural workers and tenant farmers. The 1910 census counted roughly 120 people on the larger Rancho Santa Margarita, including about 90 people with Hispanic last names. By 1920, the area included Japanese laborers as well as Hispanic and Anglo residents.<\/p>\n

The community grew more visible in the 1920s and 1930s.<\/p>\n

Archibald Blaine Haven <\/a>arrived in San Onofre in 1925 and leased roughly 1,400 acres around the train stop. By 1930, census takers were identifying the inhabitants as living at Haven\u2019s Ranch or San Onofre, and the population had grown to 135.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Archibald B. Haven resting in his ranch house, ca. 1950. (Photo and caption info courtesy of author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.)<\/p>\n

Agriculture was an important part of everyday life. Families in the area grew crops including celery, lettuce, cantaloupe, tomatoes, sugar beets and lima beans. Other tenants specialized in flowers, including poinsettias.<\/p>\n

San Onofre was still a small and isolated place, but it was a real community, with residents, farms, ranching operations and the railroad connecting it to the outside world.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Train tracks over San Onofre Creek, or the old coast highway, probably c. pre-1950s. (Photo and caption info courtesy of author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.)<\/p>\n

Then World War II changed everything.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Aerial of the area in 1941. (Photo and caption info courtesy of SONGS)<\/p>\n

In 1942, the federal government acquired the Rancho Santa Margarita property for what became Camp Pendleton. <\/a>Some families, including the Havens, were able to maintain individual leases for years, but many tenant farmers eventually moved away. The military takeover also ended Frank Ulrich\u2019s control of the San Onofre beach.<\/p>\n

The village survived for a while longer.<\/p>\n

By the 1960s, however, the last private agricultural leases had lapsed. Then came the construction of Interstate 5.<\/p>\n

The remaining buildings along the old Route 101 were in the path of the freeway and were demolished. According to Jordan\u2019s account, that ended the physical evidence of the old San Onofre village.<\/p>\n

The village disappeared, but the name survived.<\/p>\n

San Onofre\u2019s later history became associated with surfing, recreation and the nuclear power plant, creating a very different identity from the ranching community that once occupied the area.<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nLeft, An artist\u2019s concept of Unit 1, date unknown. Middle, an aerial of the site before digging began, date unknown, and at the right, \u201cThe \u201cbeach ball\u201d begins to stake shape,\u201d date unknown. (Photos and caption info courtey of SONGS) <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Aerial of the San Onofre Nuclear Station c. 1976. (Photo and caption info courtesy of the San Diego History Center.)<\/p>\n

Today, little remains to suggest that a small village once stood there. What survives instead are photographs, historical records and the memories preserved in accounts of the people who lived and worked in the area.<\/p>\n

For a place that has become synonymous with one of California\u2019s best-known beaches, it is easy to forget that San Onofre was once a small community with its own residents, farms, ranching life and stories.<\/p>\n

The 1916 photograph of Jerome O\u2019Neill and the film crew offers perhaps the most intriguing glimpse of that earlier San Onofre \u2014 a place that existed long before the freeway, state beach and nuclear plant became its defining landmarks.<\/p>\n

\"Turquoise<\/a><\/p>\n

\"San<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
\nFrom the left the decommissioned San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station has little room between the Pacific Ocean and Interstate 5 along the facility\u2019s eastern side. (Photo courtesy of California State Parks, 2026). Middle, The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is in the process of decommissioning. Photo courtesy of SONGS. Right, San Onofre Beach. (Photo courtesy of the Marine Corp.)<\/p>\n

Read more history stories\u00a0here<\/a>. Do you have a story to tell? Send an email to DebbieSklar@cox.net<\/p>\n

Sources:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Aerial photo of San Onofre, ca. 1940. (Photo from author Ryan Jordan\u2019s collection\/used with permission.) The name San…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":457278,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[16305,418,180445,74,84,76,75,12276,54102],"class_list":["post-457277","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-founder","tag-history","tag-nuclear-station","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-county","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-san-onofre","tag-village"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457277","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=457277"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457277\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/457278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=457277"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=457277"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=457277"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}