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Deep Roots at Warner-Carrillo Ranch
By Kathryn Fletcher and Ann Jarmusch
March/April 2023
 Ranch foreman Samuel B. Taylor with his son in front of the Warner-Carrillo Ranch House in 1904. Courtesy San Diego History Center |
 Drew Smith, Taylor’s great-great grandson and today’s ranch manager (kneeling in front, wearing a cowboy hat), helps lead a three-day cattle drive and branding in January 2023. Photo by Heather Smith |
More than a century before it became a museum managed by SOHO, the adobe Warner-Carrillo Ranch House (1857) was home to a series of hardy families. First came Doña Vicenta Sepúlveda de Yorba de Carrillo, who built the house and was a highly respected, successful rancher, wife, and mother. Skipping ahead, we know that Samuel B. Taylor (1861-1939) was the foreman when Walter Vail leased the ranch. Sam and his wife, Mary Helm Taylor (1870-1966), lived in the ranch house from 1895 to about 1913, longer than any other residents, and when their youngest child was grown, he told a SOHO docent that he was born in the 1858 barn. Many Taylor family descendants still live in the Warner Springs valley.
Thousands of acres of open land around the house and barn continue to support a working cattle ranch. The current ranch managers, Drew and Heather Smith, live next door to the Warner-Carrillo museum with their children, ages two and three. Drew, the great-great grandson of Sam Taylor, is carrying on the venerable ranching tradition. In January 2023, despite cold temperatures and strong wind, there was a three-day cattle drive and branding. Other valley ranchers and cowboys participated, just like in olden times.
History lives on in the Warner Springs valley. It is one of Southern California’s last places where cattle ranching is possible. We hope you’ll visit, or revisit, the Warner-Carrillo Ranch House museum and surroundings, where deep Western roots survive.
To learn more about Vicenta Carrillo and the multi-layered history of the ranch house and property, see SOHO's online exhibit: "250,000 Emigrants, the Overland Mail, and One Extraordinary Latina: The Warner-Carrillo Ranch House."
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