Council to Consider Naming Landmarks

The Joel McCrea Ranch and 10 former landmarks in the city may be designated city landmarks Tuesday by the City Council, which has appointed itself the city’s cultural heritage board.

The council in January transferred the responsibility of identifying Thousand Oaks historical landmarks from the Ventura County Cultural Heritage Board to the Thousand Oaks cultural heritage board: the council itself.

Council members must now decide whether the city sites the county board deemed landmarks should retain the status, and whether the McCrea ranch should be added to the list. City officials are recommending both.

The late actor’s cattle ranch at the eastern end of the Santa Rosa Valley was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in April. The council has already named the former City Hall building at 401 Hillcrest Drive a landmark.

Others are:

* The Stagecoach Inn in Newbury Park, a former school, post office, steakhouse, gift shop and movie set.

* The sycamore tree near the Stagecoach Inn, believed to be more than 150 years old and marked by Chumash Indians to indicate underground drinking water.

* The Pederson House and water tower near Cal Lutheran University, built by members of the Norwegian colony that settled the Conejo Valley in 1890.

* Goebel’s Lion Farm, better known as Jungleland, the former wild animal park.

* The Hunt olive tree, the only surviving tree from an orchard planted by R. O. Hunt on the Salto Ranch, established in 1876.

* The Oakbrook Regional Park archeological area, which features Chumash pictographs and 11 archeological sites.

* The Dos Vientos barns, which were formerly on the Dos Vientos Ranch but have since been dismantled.

* The Crowley House, a 1910 home that served as a real estate office for the first housing development in the Conejo Valley.

* The Janss House, former weekend retreat of Peter Janss, who with his sons developed much of Thousand Oaks, Westwood and Monterey Park.

* The Banning Dam, believed to be the first or second concrete arched dam built in California.

* The original Thousand Oaks City Hall, built in 1973.