Valley History Exposed

A group of schoolchildren got a real-life history lesson Thursday as they watched archeologists unearth a portion of a historic adobe’s foundation at Campo de Cahuenga.

The ruins are beneath a parking lot next to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Red Line subway station now being built on Lankershim Boulevard across from Universal Studios.

According to historians, the adobe is where an 1847 peace agreement was signed ending the Mexican War in California.

So far, archeologists have uncovered the original rocks used in the foundation, pottery shards and nails, MTA officials said.

The exposed remains will be surveyed, inspected, photographed and documented before the site is covered over again because there are no city funds or definitive plans to permanently display the adobe foundation.

“We have a chance to look at [the foundation], explore it, interpret it,” said Jim Sowell, MTA environmental compliance manager. “We can get so much information about the area’s past.”

About 80 children from the East Valley YMCA in Van Nuys and Burbank Boulevard Elementary School in North Hollywood were invited by transportation officials and historical preservationists to see history in the making.

The young visitors began their hourlong tour in a replica of the original adobe adjacent to the excavation site. There, they listened to historical presentations about Los Angeles’ earliest settlers.

Among the speakers was Angie Dorame Behrns, a member of the Gabrielino/Tongva Nation, who encouraged the children to learn all they can about their lineage.

“It’s so important for them to know their own history,” Behrns said after her presentation. “It was a multiracial group of people who founded Los Angeles. Knowing that brings us all together.”

Behrns’ message apparently got through to Anush Aveisyan, a fourth-grader from Burbank Boulevard Elementary.

“You should be proud of who you are and where you come from,” she said.

Schoolmate Larissa Compton said the presentations and historical excavation helped her to link the past with the present.

“There are a lot of Indians still living in Los Angeles,” she said. “I like the adobes [built] by the Spanish that are still here. That’s cool.”

Octavia Johnson, 12, a camper in the YMCA’s winter break program, said she was inspired to research her roots.

“I’m going to ask my mother about our family history,” she said. “And maybe go to the library.”

The adobe was the site where Mexican Gen. Andres Pico and American Lt. Col. John C. Fremont sufficiently set aside their differences to sign the accord ending the U.S. conquest of California. The Mexican War of 1846-48 allowed the United States to expand its territory to include what is now California and parts of other states.

For years the structure was known as the Don Tomas Feliz Adobe and was believed to date from 1845. Archeologists, however, say new information indicates Don Tomas was buried downtown in the 1830s, and that the adobe is much older.

The adobe is on land that was once part of Mission San Fernando’s grazing properties, experts said. The dwelling is believed to have been a home or ranch quarters.