Morrell House

The Morrell House is an interesting historic site in Redondo Beach.  The house was built in 1906.

The museum right next to the Morrell House is an old house built at the turn of the century also, and has a lot of pictures and other memorabalia documenting the history of Redondo Beach.

The park next to the houses is nice.  Cool stuff.  Here are a couple of website links with more information.

Morrell House

Redondo Beach History

Historic Sites-Banning House

The Banning House is another interesting historic site in California.

Phineas Banning, the original owner of Banning House, moved from Wilmington, Delaware to San Pedro, California in 1851.  He was instrumental in the transportation business (stagecoach), building the Los Angeles Harbor and constructing the railroad.  He was also one of the founders of Wilmington, California.

He initially worked as a store clerk and then a stagecoach driver.  He started his own staging and shipping company later.

Banning acquired the land where he built his house from Manuel Dominguez, a member of the family that originally owned the land in this area.  The land was has been owned by the City of Los Angeles since 1927.

Banning died at a young age after an accident, but his influence on Southern California history is significant.

Here are several web sites with more information.

http://www.banningmuseum.org/ 

http://www.socalhistory.org/biographies/phineas-banning.html 

http://waterandpower.org/museum/Early_Views_of_San_Pedro_and_Wilmington.html 

Historic sites-Dominguez Rancho

I love old historic sites and buildings. The Rancho Dominguez is important in California's history and it's a beautiful place. The Rancho is the first Spanish land grant in California. The land was granted to Juan Jose Dominguez in 1784 by King Carlos III. Dominguez was a retired soldier who came to California with the Portola expedition and later with Father Juniperro Serra. The land passed to Cristobal Dominguez, Juan Jose's nephew, and then to Cristobal's son, Manuel. Manuel completed construction on the Rancho in 1826, and this is how it is seen today.

http://dominguezrancho.org/