Chapters 1 - U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Chapter 4
German immigrants from San Francisco arrived to grow grapes and produce wine; they
bought a portion of the Los Alamitos Rancho in the 1850s and named it Anaheim. To support
their agricultural endeavors, water was diverted from the Santa Ana River near the presentday
location of Prado Dam (U.S. Navy 2011). As this community thrived, the need for a port to
ship out the produce emerged. By 1868, the Germans had established the port of Anaheim
Landing, west of the Refuge (Lavender 1987). Anaheim Landing also became popular as a
seaside resort when farmers together with their families brought their produce to ship. The
importance of the Landing as a port lessened with the arrival of the Southern Pacific and the
Santa Fe railroads, but the resort area continued to grow.
Early development in the area now known as Seal Beach began around the small harbor in
Anaheim Bay. By 1903, development plans for the community of Seal Beach (originally known
as Bay City) were being implemented by the Bayside Land Company. This development
began about the same time (1904) that the Pacific Electric Railway Company commenced
operating Red Car Service on the Newport–Balboa Line. This railway, built on landfill, played
an important role in the growth of Seal Beach, but by 1940, ridership was so low that
passenger service on the line was abandoned.
The 1924 discovery of oil at Seal Beach and then later at Long Beach and Huntington Beach
stimulated an economic development boom. Seaside resorts that had begun at Anaheim
Landing flourished between Long Beach and Huntington Beach. The City of Seal Beach
became a tourist destination, popular for its roller coaster, the longest pier south of San
Francisco, bathhouses, gambling halls and ships, saloons and bars, and rum runners.
The Navy acquired the property that is now NWSSB in 1944 and began creation of a harbor
and the construction of wharves. After World War II, NWSSB was operated on a reduced
workload, but returned to full operation during the Korean War. The Cold War brought
aircraft and rocket production facilities into the area (U.S. Navy 1988). Between the 1940s and
the early 1970s, several areas of NWSSB that are now included in the Refuge were used for a
variety of military purposes, including clean fill disposal areas, a landfill operation, explosive
burning grounds, primer/salvage yard, and quenching water disposal (Naval Energy and
Environmental Support Activity 1985).
4.4.3 Existing Cultural Resources Investigations and Research
Numerous cultural resource surveys have been conducted within NWSSB, and the areas
previously surveyed within the Refuge are indicated in Figure 4-15. The earliest survey appears to
have been carried out in 1980 on 160 acres in the southeast part of the Refuge (Cottrell and Cooley
1980). No cultural resources were identified. By 1992, the majority of NWSSB had been surveyed
(Brock 1985, U.S. Navy 1988, Stickel 1991, Clevenger and Crawford 1997a), including all of the
areas of dry land within the boundaries of the Refuge.
One of the sites recorded during these surveys, CA-ORA-298, is located within the Refuge
boundary. This site, which was first identified as a shell midden with a low density of associated
artifacts, was evaluated for listing on the National Register for Historic Places (NRHP) in 1993.
Test excavations associated with this evaluation indicated an area of relatively undisturbed cultural
deposit. Recovered artifacts included debitage fragments, a biface, a metate fragment, and a
fragment of modified bone. The majority of the biface and debitage fragments were made from
chert, with a few made from volcanic material and obsidian. Artifacts were recovered to a depth of
80 centimeters. Radiocarbon analysis yielded a date of 4,530 ± 60 years B.P. (2535 B.C.). This
date places the site occupation during the Millingstone Period and is similar to the radiocarbon
4-80 Seal Beach National Wildlife Refuge