Name/Title
Oral History of Mary Campbell RixfordEntry/Object ID
2002.002.001TScope and Content
Rixford went to college at the University of California, Berkeley. As a child, she visited her grandfather’s ranch for the summer. Later, she moved from Stockton to Los Altos for better weather around 1969.
The interview covers the ranch, which was first bought by Mary’s grandfather, who passed it down to his four children. Mary’s father bought it from his three other siblings. After his death, Mary managed the property. The ranch was twelve hundred acres, spanning the area from what is now Echo to Parma, Rixford Lane, and Campbell. It was planted with stone fruit and walnuts. Her family vacationed there in the summer. It was cared for primarily by groundskeepers before much of it was sold by Mary’s mother. Farms were a common vacation spot for people from San Francisco, used as summer homes and presumably a source of income. The area was mostly farmland and orchards when Rixford was a child, and the farm was cared for by other people.Collection
Oral History CollectionOral History Details
Interviewee
Mary Campbell RixfordInterviewer
Los Altos Historical CommissionInterview Date
Aug 3, 1980