The Sea Monster of Santa Anita and

Other Tales from J.J. Hollister

Do you have any stories about the old days in Gaviota?

There was a lion hunter named Charlie Tant, who had a bunch of dogs, and made his living by hunting mountain lions around Las Cruces. There was a bounty on the lions because they used to ravage the livestock. Charlie would go out into the mountains and stay for weeks, not returning until he got his lion. Finally, he would bring his kill to the fish and game department, collect the bounty, and move on.

One day, Charlie captured a big old Tom bobcat. He and a friend stuffed the bobcat into a leather suitcase. I don't know how they managed this -- the cat could take you apart. Anyway, they stuffed the bobcat into a leather suitcase, took the suitcase into the Gaviota Pass, left it there, and stood back to watch the fun. Very few cars came through in those days. Finally a big station wagon type car with five or six people in it screeched to a halt. One fellow jumped out, picked up the suitcase, and threw it into the car. Charlie and his friend could see the car suddenly begin to zig zag. Now it stopped, all the doors were flung open, and everyone jumped out. The last one out was a very bewildered bobcat who took off and disappeared into the hills.

Any Hollister Ranch adventures?

There were little telephones with cranks when I was young. There was one line, and there would be a certain number of rings, and we would connect to the Gaviota store from which there was a connection to Santa Barbara. You had to shout to push your voice through the wire to the store, and then shout even more to push it hard enough to get it all the way to Santa Barbara. To this day, when someone calls me up long-distance, I shout into the phone.

One day, my father rang the Museum of Natural History to tell them that there was a sea monster out on the beach at Santa Anita. He told them it was important that they come out and see it. Now in those days, everyone would amuse themselves by listening in on other people's telephone conversations. And as you can imagine, news of a sea monster was a big deal. You can just hear all the little clicks along the telephone line -- everyone panics! Oh, we were so excited!

We went down to the beach. There was the sea monster -- it was very long, and had a great big head, and it was dead. We waited and waited for the museum people to get there. In the meantime, everyone else had come to the beach. We had a little village down there by the time the people from the museum arrived. It turned out that the sea monster was a boa constrictor. It must have been put on a ship, died, and was pitched overboard, where it drifted to the shore. Mystery solved.

What kinds of pets did you have?

My best pet was caught in the wild by Fred Hauk. He caught three raccoons, and one was for my sister and me. We named it Freddy Coon, and he was our favorite pet. He lived with us for three or four years, just like a dog or cat. In the late 1930's we even took him with us in the car to visit my mother's family in San Rafael. At some point he got to biting. We took him back to the ranch and turned him loose at La Cuarta. We cried all the way back to Winchester Canyon."

Another interesting pet was our pig. My father was out in Bullito Canyon and there was a wild mother pig with a bunch of little babies. The little ones are striped, almost like chipmunks, and so cute! My father rode the mother down, and the baby pigs scattered. He grabbed one of the babies and just barely managed to get back into the saddle with the mother pig chasing him. He put the little pig into the gunny sack he had with him and brought it home. We took it to Winchester Canyon and it became very attached to my sister. She was like its mother -- it followed her everywhere, and became very upset whenever she left. The pig's name was Chipmunk -- we called it Chipper.

Well, my family was often visited by fancy people from back east in those days who would come to Santa Barbara to escape the east coast winters. One day, one of these friends called and was in the process of making arrangements with my mother to come out for tea. My sister had just left, and so the pig was squealing. Mother said, 'Excuse me, ma'am. I have to put the pig out. It's making too much noise.' When she returned to the phone, the caller said, 'Never mind. I think we'll be busy that day.' The lady must have thought we lived with pigs in the house. I guess we did.

What was school like at the Hollister Ranch?

At the ranch, they had the 'Drake School', and the building is still there, close to the creek, only now it is called the bunk house. There were only eight to twelve students, from first grade to eighth, all in one room -- every size, shape, and form. It was five miles to the school, and it started at eight o'clock. We rode horses sometimes. For the winter, father built a shelter we could sit in, and he'd come for us with a tractor. We had one wonderful teacher. Her name was Ruthie, but she married my uncle and stopped teaching. We used to go down to the beach for recess. Of course, we could never hear the bell from the beach.

What did you do for recreation?

On weekends and summer, we'd spend a lot of time at the beach. No one had a bathing suit. We were all stark naked, riding the waves. And there was hiking, of course. And riding. My grandfather gave my sister a horse when she was very young, and she liked to ride. Still does.

I liked to do other devilish things. I liked to get in the barn, and climb up on the haystacks. There was a big dairy bull. He had a ring in his nose -- and he was so mean! I used to tease him. I also used to hunt for arrowheads at Bullito Beach -- I would spend hours doing that.

The railroad was fun. If we wanted to get on board we could stop the train by waving a red handkerchief. One time I got to be the one to do it. I remember it coming around Coho and onto the big straight, coming closer, and then I waved the handkerchief, and it was so much fun to see that big thing stop.

Once a month or so, the kids would get to go to town. We would clean up and dress up, slick as a whistle. I remember once on the way to town, between Cuarta and Alegria, we came upon a cow with bloat. There was my father and all of us in our clean white shirts, but we had to stop and take care of it. We had to stick the cow to let the air out -- not a thing to do in a white shirt. But that was often a part of the journey to town, stopping along the way to care for the herd.

In 1936,we all decided to ride in the Fiesta parade on our little horses. It was grand. But what I remember most is coming back, late at night, going down Alegria. In front of our headlights, a figure suddenly appeared, and he was running as fast as a person can run. Then he tripped, rolled down the hillside, and disappeared into the night. We didn't know what to make of it.

We were isolated at the Ranch, and news reached us late. A day or two later, the sheriff called my father, who was a deputy. The sheriff said, 'There is a hangman in Alegria Canyon. We need your help.' The hangman, whose name was Lee, had come over from the Gaviota store and hung himself with his belt from an oak tree. He had been discovered by a railroad worker. This worker had a lot of dogs, and he loved to go after raccoons at night. That's what he was doing when he bumped into the hangman, who swung back and knocked him down. He was scared out of his wits and took off running. That's when we saw him in our headlights. Well, that solved a great mystery.

My father had to build a little coffin for Lee. He took his favorite horse, Oso, up to where the hanging was, and Oso was so spooked by the dead man that my father had to lead him back down. This was all big news for us little kids on the ranch.

What memories do you have of the Great Depression?

I was little, but I felt the Great Depression through my folks. My father was in stocks and bonds. That was one reason we came down to the ranch. The Depression was just what the word said -- people were down, depressed. There were hoboes everywhere. They would get off at Drake or Bullito and my grandmother or the Chinese cook would give them a sandwich. It was a type of fright that lives with you night and day. There was no government help in those days. People were despondent. It shaped my father's life.

What was your special place at the Hollister Ranch when you were a boy?

There was a little tree on the side of the road near the big house. I found a rope at the barn, tied it onto the tree, and I swung. Whenever a car came by, I could sit up there and watch. Whenever a car came across the wooden bridge, it made a lot of noise, and Grandpa always looked to see who was coming before they arrived.

And I loved barns. The barns were full of bats, bats in every corner. I loved to throw a rock and get them to fly.

Sometimes butterflies would fill the eucalyptus trees near where the office now is. I would toss a stone to make them fly. It was so beautiful.

Who was your best friend?

My best friend was my sister. She was three years older than me, and oh, such a tyrant, as older sisters are! But it was just the two of us, most of the time.