Page 2 - Olivenhain Book

Olivenhain History
In the early 1800’s California was a vast, sparsely inhabited territory of Mexico. Andreas Antonio Ybarra made a formal request to the Mexican government and was awarded a land grant of 4,431 acres called “Los Encinitas” in 1842. Theodore Pinther and Conrad Stroebel were part of group called the Colony of Olivenhain in Denver, Colorado and they purchased a portion of the parcel in 1884 and called it Rancho Las Encinitas. The colony began with seven members – Theodore Pinther, Joseph Ullrich, Louis Denk, Otto Pinther, Lina Pinther and Johann Bumann. Each member paid an initiation fee, a membership fee, and monthly dues. A member in good standing would be entitled to a five acre parcel of cultivated land, a house of moderate size built on their property, and the use of all colony-owned property such as horse teams, wagons and fruit processing machinery. The membership increased by the end of the year with an additional 67 colonists arriving from Denver. Hundreds of acres were cleared and plowed to create the colony-owned farm and homes and roads were constructed.
The colonists ran into a problem, the lack of sufficient water. As a result, olive and citrus groves were replaced with livestock farming. The gradual decline of farming during the 1950’s and the importation of water to Southern California slowly transformed the area into a residential community. In 1887, a copper deposit was discovered and a copper mine was developed by the Encinitas Copper Company, which sporadically produced a low grade of copper ore until 1917.
Modern conveniences were slow to arrive in Olivenhain. The first rural mail delivery began in 1910. Telephone services were extended from Encinitas in 1938 and electricity came to Olivenhain in 1946. The Olivenhain Municipal Water District was formally established in 1959, marking the end of reliance on wells and cisterns as the only source of water. Lone Jack Road was finally paved in the early 1970’s. The name Olivenhain is from the German name which means “Olive Grove”. The German Settlers built the meeting hall which still stands. It is used today for community functions such as the annual Oktoberfest, Haunted House, summer movie series, craft fairs and a variety of civic group meetings.
02/2017 - INFORMATION IS DEEMED RELIABLE, BUT NOT GUARANTEED. 1