An historic landmark home built in 1831 and three residences built between 1926 and 1982 represent the spectrum of San Diego County’s romance with its adobe heritage. The Ninth Annual San Diego Adobe Home Tour, Sunday will allow visitors to experience California’s multi-cultural roots in the rancho hacienda and California ranch house styles, where immigrant pioneer, Spanish and Mexican influences coalesce.
This year’s tour showcases the 1831-built Osuna adobe near the village of Rancho Santa Fe. In 1924, Lillian Rice was commissioned to oversee the restoration and rehabilitation of the old adobe home. This historic property is rarely open to the public.
Further down the Del Dios Highway, visitors will be awed by a gated property and 1926 home blending Mexican-patio rancho and Spanish Revival styles.
In Escondido, attendees will tour a 1958 adobe ranch-style hacienda built by Weir Bros. Adobe Company, and a sprawling 1982 hacienda-style ranch house of post-modern construction.
The tour is a volunteer effort of the San Diego Adobe Heritage Association, whose mission is to inspire the appreciation and understanding of adobe heritage in San Diego County. The San Diego Adobe Heritage Association website serves as a resource for adobe homeowners looking to remodel, restore or maintain their adobe home, or
The Adobe Home Tour was established to create awareness of the unique qualities of adobe homes. Proceeds of the tour support the Escondido History Center. Ticket holders will receive a full-color program with information about the history and architectural significance of each home. Docents at each site supplement the program’s information.
Tickets go on sale in January 2020 at http://adobehometour.com or at the Escondido History Center. Ticket receipts may be exchanged on the day of the tour at one of two locations in Escondido and Rancho Santa Fe, for a program which lists the addresses of each of the properties. This is a self-guided tour.
The tour is a volunteer effort of the San Diego Adobe Heritage Association, whose mission is to inspire the appreciation and understanding of adobe heritage in San Diego County. The San Diego Adobe Heritage Association website serves as a resource for adobe homeowners looking to remodel, restore or maintain their adobe home, or for those with an interest in adobe construction.
Check out th Richard fountain on the adobe home tour.//San Diego Adobe Heritage Association
Event: The Ninth Annual San Diego Adobe Home Tour, Romance of the Rancho
Date: March 22, 2020, 10:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., rain or shine
$30, available January 2020 from the Adobe Home Tour website http://adobehometour.com or from the Escondido History Center, 321 N Broadway, Escondido, 92025, http://escondidohistory.orgWhere: Ticket holders will redeem their receipt for a program at one of two locations in Rancho Santa Fe and Escondido. This is a self-guided tour; the program lists the addresses and directions to the Osuna Ranch and three homes.
Proceeds: Proceeds benefit the Escondido History Center.
Accessibility: These are older, private properties with uneven steps, narrow entries and steep walkways.
Information: http://adobehometour.com
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Ruth Harber in June 1942 with her parents and brother in Brussels. It was the last photo taken of them before going into hiding to escape Hitler’s march into Belgium./VC History Museum
Local holocaust survivor recalls teenage years in hiding
— Robert Lerner, Valley Center History Museum Historian
Ruth Harber of Valley Center and Anne Frank, one of the most discussed Jewish victims of the Holocaust, share a similar life as young teenagers: both spent two years in hiding from the Nazis in the early 1940s.
Although their lives mirror one another, Anne died in a concentration camp, but Ruth survived.
To commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day on January 27, the Valley Center History Museum is mounting a photo tribute to Mrs. Harber.
At age 14, she and her Jewish family went into hiding in Brussels in 1942 after the Nazis occupied the Belgian city. She spent two years inside a private home, sometimes in a cellar room carved out by her father. She learned English by reading a French to English dictionary and secretly listening to BBC shortwave radio broadcasts.
Her dream of freedom and an escape into the outside world came on September 4, 1944, when Belgium was liberated. She recalled that she and her father walked five miles to join her mother and brother, who also were in hiding. Other family members perished in concentration camps
Ruth Harber in a recent photo./VC History Museum
Arriving in America in 1952, she found her way to San Diego County and, eventually, Valley Center. For 15 years, she was a personal assistant to Helen Copley, owner of Copley Press and publisher of the San Diego Union and Evening Tribune.
In 2006, Mrs. Harber spoke of her early life as a survivor during a presentation at the Valley Center Library.
The event was part of a major exhibition co-sponsored with the History Museum featuring a replica of the attic in which Anne Frank and her family hid in Amsterdam.
Although the exhibit was open to the public during limited admissions and limited hours over a 10-day period, more than 1,000 visitors passed through the rooms. The exhibit was created by the San Diego Center for Jewish Culture.
Now 91, Mrs. Harber is known to many North County residents for her activism over many years as a fighter for environmental causes. She was honored for her life work by the San Diego County Board of Supervisors in 2005 when it issued a proclamation and declared June 14 as Ruth Harber Day
A book, “And Somehow We Survive,” was written by her brother, Rudy Rosenberg, in 1970 and tells the story of their survival and harrowing years before and during World War II. In 1991, he attended the Conference of Hidden Children in New York
The photo display at the History Museum, 29200 Cole Grade Road, will continue through February. The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 12 noon to 4 p.m. Admission is free. For more information, visit vchistory.org or call (760) 749-2993.
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