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The Call House Museum
This building is the only
one surviving from the "ranch era"
after the Russians left
Fort Ross in 1841.
 It
is open for guided tours only. Its artifacts and renovation were done "in house" by
park staff and volunteers, with grants from the Sonoma County Landmarks
Commission and the Mercedes Pearce and John Stafford Trust. The cooperation
and encouragement of the Call family descendants helped to recreate
the life style of George Washington Call (1829-1907) and his young
Chilean wife, Mercedes Leiva (1850-1933), who bought 2500 acres
of the Fort Ross or Muniz Rancho in 1873. While maintaining a house
in San Francisco, they began to develop the ranch (cattle, dairying
and orchards) and a harbor for lumber products and local produce.
The Calls built this residence in 1878, as a headquarters for the ranch and
shipping operations, and a home for their family, which eventually included
nine children. They built the one and a half story front section (the living
and bed rooms) and incorporated an earlier, one story structure built by
a previous owner, William Benitz (dining rooms and kitchen) on the back.
The Call family lived in this house almost a century until son Carlos,
the last occupant, died in 1972.
This house was first opened in May, 2003,
and is considered a work in progress. Volunteers maintain the
historic garden and give guided tours on the first weekend of each
month from 1 to 4 PM. Many of the furnishings belonged to the Call
family. Others have been purchased and are meant to be typical of
a well-to-do American family living on the isolated California coast
ca 1880-1910.
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Tour
of the Call House
Highlights from the Call Family Album
The Garden
My Life at Fort Ross by Laura Call Carr
Memories of Fort Ross by Laurie Horn |
