Country music legend Buck Owens was never much of a city guy. Born in what was then the town of Sherman, Texas, he moved with his family to the even smaller town of Mesa, Ariz. during the Depression and didn\u2019t come to Bakersfield, population 35,000, until 1951.<\/p>\n
It was no surprise, then, that after divorcing his wife of 15 years in 1971, Owens wanted some time and space to himself. So, he moved to the country.<\/p>\n
For the next several decades he lived in a small adobe almost 20 miles outside of Bakersfield, just off Zerker Road. The house was a little quirky, and uncomfortably cold in winter, but it came with more than 120 acres of land. That\u2019s where he died in 2006, succumbing to a heart attack just hours after playing a show at his Crystal Palace.<\/p>\n
That same country estate is now for sale \u2014 without the adobe, it should be noted, but with a 6,741-square-foot mansion in its place.<\/p>\n
The property is impressive and, considering Owens lived there and left behind a private fishing pond that\u2019s still there, arguably historic.<\/p>\n
Although he had other homes around town, most notably a place at 309 Panorama Drive in northeast Bakersfield, his old country estate reflects a side of Owens the public rarely glimpsed.<\/p>\n
A friend of his, former Buckaroo Jim Shaw, said Owens deliberately chose a property outside of town. The modest size of the house was a reflection of who he was.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuck wasn\u2019t a big, fancy-house guy. He really wasn\u2019t somebody who wanted a bunch of square footage,\u201d he said, adding that Owens marched to \u201cthe beat of a different drum.\u201d<\/p>\n
The adobe was very much that. Even in the 1970s it was an outdated house, with a master bedroom but no other bedrooms except one for the live-in maid.<\/p>\n
The kitchen was \u201cteeny,\u201d in Shaw\u2019s words, but the fireplace was big enough to put a car in. Owens added a garage to the property, along with a fishing pond that remains much the way it was.<\/p>\n
Not interested in farming so much land, Owens leased out the bulk of the property. But he spent much of his life there in peace.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe loved the house,\u201d Shaw said.<\/p>\n
These days the estate looks very different. It boasts some 80 acres of nut-bearing pistachio trees, along with a pool, spa, tennis court and guest residence.<\/p>\n
The two-story house itself, built in 2013 after the adobe\u2019s demolition, is what you might expect from a property listed for sale at $5.9 million. It has three bedrooms, a gourmet kitchen, an office and game room, not to mention more than 400 fully paid-for solar panels.<\/p>\n
Executive Director Mike McCoy at the Kern County Museum said it was just like Owens to settle down in the country.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuck was never an (urban) guy,\u201d he said. \u201cI don\u2019t think he always liked living in town.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe didn\u2019t like neighbors. He was always very private. He wanted elbow room.\u201d<\/p>\n
Owens certainly had that living off Zerker Road. The place is surrounded by citrus orchards, such that visitors can\u2019t so much as catch a glimpse of the home without trespassing.<\/p>\n
Neither was McCoy surprised that Owens would choose to live in a small home instead of a large one.<\/p>\n
\u201cBuck was very much \u2014 he grew up the hard way and he didn\u2019t forget that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he was most comfortable in everyday spaces. He wasn\u2019t a fancy-schmancy guy.\u201d<\/p>\n
The small kitchen seemed to fit Owens\u2019 profile, too, given his propensity for eating out. Many meals he ate at Zingo\u2019s, other times at his Crystal Palace, McCoy recalled.<\/p>\n
Owens preferred simple food, too, which was perfect for the kitchen in the adobe.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would\u2019ve been a sandwich and a cup of coffee,\u201d McCoy said. \u201cMaybe some scrambled eggs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Country music legend Buck Owens was never much of a city guy. Born in what was then the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":511223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[160398,151,153,152,25817,7,9172,9788],"class_list":["post-511222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bakersfield","tag-adobe","tag-bakersfield","tag-bakersfield-headlines","tag-bakersfield-news","tag-buck-owens","tag-california","tag-house","tag-kitchen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511222","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=511222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}