After 3 years of driving past it, thinking, "I should really check that out one of these days," I finally visited the Heritage Hill Historical Park about a mile from my house.
Heritage Hill is in Lake Forest on Serrano just a stone's throw off the corner of Lake Forest and Trabuco (Behind the large Ralph's center).
The park sits on, and includes, the oldest structure in Orange County, the Serrano Adobe. Other structures have been relocated to Heritage Hill: The Bennett Ranch House, El Toro Grammar School, and St. George's Episcopal Church. And there are some structures which have been built in place, such as the reproduction Native American hut, the outdoor oven and firepit, etc.
So let's begin our little tour:
SERRANO ADOBE
As I mentioned, this is the oldest standing structure in Orange County. Owned by the Serrano family (of course). It was not the first Adobe, as the Serranos had built another previous to this. After the Serranos, it was also owned by the Whiting Family (of Whiting Ranch fame). The property was extensively refurbished in the 1930's when it was expanded in back, and a former barn area was turned into a bedroom. The Heritage Hill folks are trying to remove "exotic" plants and restore the landscaping to more native plants.
Much of the furnishings are not Serrano originals. Some belonged to the Whiting family, but most are donated items accurate to the period, intended to give you an idea of how it looked. There are also some really awesome vintage dresses displayed around the property. This is probably the oldest style dress on display.
Here's another cool one, a little more recent style (and by recent I mean only 100 years old)
Awesome lamp hanging in the living room
Bonnet on display in one of the bedrooms
The dining area is part of the added-on structure
Ladies' vanity items. The tool in the foreground is a finger stretcher for kid gloves because they had to launder them and they'd shrink. There are also two buttonholers laying on top of the spats, and the cup thing in front of the photograph is a hair receiver - ladies would save the hair that came out when brushing, and wind them into rat tails for hairpieces (or make it into jewelry like the bracelet on display in the bell jar at the back)
Apparently Mrs. Whiting picked these beds up down in Mexico
More to come...