On July 5, 2012, Harry Bell, the 2011 Santa Clarita Valley Man of the Year, died in a plane crash at Rancho Camulos together with co-pilot Michael Dwain Boolen.  Their TL-Ultralight Sting Sport aircraft crashed around 1:25 p.m. on Rancho Camulos property just north of Highway 126, across from the historic Camulos buildings. The day before, Harry had taken part ...

On April 28, 1943, Rancho Camulos Owner, August Alexander “Buddy” Rübel, was killed when he was driving an ambulance that came into contact with a German land mine in North Africa. Born on July 6, 1899, Rüben was born in Switzerland while his New York parents, August Alexander Rübel and Florence Taber Toel, were vacationing. Rüben was later raised on ...

On April 2, 1910, filming of D.W. Griffith’s “Ramona,” starring Mary Pickford, the first known movie shot in the Santa Clarita Valley, wrapped up filming after two days at the historic Rancho Camulos. The film industry was still in its infancy at the time, household names like Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and even the star of “Ramona,” Mary Pickford herself, ...

On Feb. 19, 1803, displaced families from the Caamulus (Camulos) village in the Piru village were baptized at the Mission San Fernando Rey de España in the modern-day Mission Hills in the San Fernando Valley. The baptism was part of a widespread effort by Mexican-Spanish missionaries to convert Indigenous peoples to Christianity, often through coercive and underhanded means. As foreign ...

On Feb. 16, 2000, Rancho Camulos, a historic 19th-century adobe ranch located along Highway 126, was officially designated a National Historic Landmark. Originally part of the Rancho San Francisco land grant, Rancho Camulos was established in 1853 by Ygnacio del Valle and became a thriving agricultural operation known for its citrus groves and vineyards. However, it is perhaps best known ...

On Jan. 23, 1882, author and activist Helen Hunt Jackson arrived at Rancho Camulos, making a brief yet historically significant stop during her journey from Los Angeles to Santa Barbara. Though her visit lasted only a few hours, it would play a key role in shaping her most famous work, the 1884 novel Ramona. At the time of Jackson’s visit, ...

The Ramona Chapel at Heritage Junction was formally dedicated on Dec. 9, 2001, celebrating the completion of a year-long restoration led by SCV Historical Society board member Allan Howe. A plumbing contractor by trade, 84-year-old Howe worked on the Ramona chapel nearly every day from August 2000 to December 2001. He painstakingly rebuilt damaged woodwork and uncovered the original color ...

On this day in 1841, Antonio del Valle, a Mexican soldier and grantee of over 48,000 acres of land that would eventually form the Santa Clarita Valley, died. Born in 1788 in Compostela, Jalisco, Mexico,  del Valle served as a lieutenant for the Mexican army, fighting for his home country against Spain during the Mexican Revolution of the 1820s and ...

August Alexander “Buddy” Rübel, owner of Rancho Camulos, was killed on April 28, 1943, when the ambulance he was driving in North Africa struck a German land mine. Born July 6, 1899, in Switzerland while his New York parents, August Alexander Rübel and Florence Taber Toel, were vacationing, Rübel grew up on the East Coast.  He served in the American ...

On April 2, 1910, filming of D.W. Griffith’s “Ramona,” starring Mary Pickford, the first known movie shot in the Santa Clarita Valley, wrapped up filming after two days at the historic Rancho Camulos. The film industry was still in its infancy at the time, household names like Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and even the star of “Ramona,” Mary Pickford herself, ...