Santa Barbara Historical Museum - History

History

In October 1932 a voluntary association was formed consisting of representatives from a number of local organizations. The Articles of Association laid out the purposes of this new group: to foster research and study of the history of the city and county of Santa Barbara; to collect, preserve, and make available materials having to do with same; and to provide for exhibition of such materials. This new association was the Santa Barbara Historical Society.

Soon after its founding, the Society was offered the “tower” room in the Santa Barbara County Courthouse as an exhibition space and the Society began to collect, catalogue, and store artifacts and documents. For the first ten years, little changed in the character of the Historical Society.

In 1942, the Society moved to establish classes of membership, admit individuals, and set up a schedule of dues. The result was a considerable increase in membership and in the acquisition of materials for collections. The next step was taken the following year when the Society incorporated under California law; on June 7, 1943 the Santa Barbara Historical Society became a California non-profit corporation.

As membership grew, Society activities increased. In 1947, the Society published its first book, China Trade Days in California by D. MacKenzie Brown, based upon the papers of Alpheus Thompson, an early prosperous Santa Barbara merchant. The Society’s growth necessitated a larger space than the courthouse tower room. Katherine Bagg Hastings offered her home, the Trussell-Winchester Adobe at 412 West Montecito Street, as a new headquarters. The house had been built in 1854 by Horatio Gates Trussell for his family. Mrs. Hastings arranged to transfer ownership of the house to the Society upon her death; this transfer took place in 1955.

The search for a permanent home continued throughout the 1950s. Early in the decade the Society opened negotiations with the Franciscans at the Santa Barbara Mission regarding use of a portion of the mission cloister for office and exhibition space. A license agreement was signed in January 1954 and the first exhibit was held in the new quarters in May. The Society would remain housed in the Old Mission for the next eleven years.