Montecito Historian Trish Davis on Women’s History Month

Montecito’s Trish Davis is being featured in my column for her contributions to preserve the history of Montecito. Davis was recommended to me by the Montecito Fire Protection District Fire Chief David Neels in response to my community request for Montecito women to be featured in my news column for Women’s History Month.Neels stated in his email reply, “We have discussed this at the department and many of us have selected Trish Davis for Women’s History Month. She is integral to preserving the history of the Montecito community and is so knowledgeable about what makes this community so special.”

Davis has been the Head of the Montecito History Preservation Department with her office and historical treasures at the Montecito Library for approximately 14 years. A local resident for over 50 years, she has served as the History Chair and member of the Montecito Association for 16 years and is a member of the Coast Village Association. Previously she served as a President of MERRAG, was founder of the Santa Barbara Bike Coalition, was Santa Barbara Yacht Club Person of the Year, and with her husband founded the first street vendor Hot Dog Stand locally called the Hot Dog Construction Co. Fun fact, as a retired American Airlines Stewardess, Davis founded the SB Airport Tour Program and worked as a tour guide at LAX for 15 years.

I met with Davis at the History Office this week for an interview and photo op with Neels.

Q.How did you get involved in covering the history for Montecito?

A. I’ve been fortunate to live in historic places. And so I came in one day to volunteer in the history department at the Montecito Library, which I did for one year. I went to the Montecito Association meetings on Tuesdays and joined the MA Board. The history office is part of the MA Board, and I have been the Chair of the MA History Committee for 14 years. 

Why is preserving history important to you?

If we don’t take care of our history, it’s really hard to go into the future unless you know what the past has been about. And I feel that I’ve been in the community for 50 years and dealt with a lot of agencies. Working here has been a magical spot. You can almost hear the textbooks talking to you. People who come for all different reasons, whether its PBS, or scientists checking on the past debris flow, or people who just bought a house and want to know if it’s historic, we work with a whole lot of historians. Our goal here is to try to get the information the person is looking for, if we don’t have it, we can get them to the people and organizations that may have the answer. What we have here is all donated.

How did the Montecito History Office start?

The reason this office exists is in 1975, before the Montecito Association was founded, it was called the Montecito Protective Agency [MPA]. David Yager on the Board of Supervisors felt the MPA needed a historic component. He went to Kit Tremainewho was well known in Montecito and collected history and asked her to help start this office. So, Kit, Maria Herold, Maria Churchill, David Myrick, all jumped on board and had their own board they worked with – the Moody sisters, Lutah Riggs, and George Washington Smith, an array of people that helped create this community. That is how we got started and we try to collect things ever since, although our space is limited. We just started sharing some of things like our oral histories with the Santa Barbara Historical Museum’s Chris S. Ervin, the head archivist, because we don’t have the facilities here to preserve them. We have boxes of Anna Bliss’s letters, the Hot Springs Hotel, all the adobe info, files on the fire department, MERRAG and big estates.

What is considered a historic estate?

We say it’s historic if it is 50 years old, and there are a lot of rules and regulations that go with owning an historic estate. Many estate owners in Montecito don’t want to pay for the expense of upkeeping the historic estate so we have lost a lot of them. I would guess we have approximately 150 estates in Montecito. We do have a list, and the estates come with a name. The big old ones are disappearing. The El Mirador, built in 1950, has one house being preserved by new owner [2018] Jeff Abrams. People are either into preserving history or not, and tear it down. We don’t have the same tax program that Santa Barbara has for historic properties where a portion of the taxes you pay go back into preserving the historic home or estate.

Why is Women’s History Month important to you?

I think that it is important to recognize the talented women of our community because of their efforts to retain the uniqueness of the area. We can learn so much about our future from the past. What our goals may be and how to stay on track. Once it’s gone it’s gone forever. We should focus our thoughts on the women who should be honored in Montecito for doing great things in our community. 

Can you name a few of those Montecito Women?

Ganna Walska who created Lotusland, the largest collection of succulents in the country; the four Moody sisters who built and designed fairytale like cottages all over Montecito; Lutah Riggs, AIA and one of the first in Montecito, and who worked with George Washington Smith; Marguerite Peggy Ravenscroft who started the Santa Barbara Humane Society; Sue Grafton, an American author of the Alphabet series; Suzy Parker, a world-famous fashion model.

Anything else you’d like to share?

This community is really special, people care, and I’m proud to live in an area like this. And I can’t thank the Montecito Fire Dept and Fire Chief Neels enough for nominating me for this feature for Women’s History Month.