Name/Title
Print, PhotographicEntry/Object ID
2007.046.0118Scope and Content
Color and Black/White Photographs:
280 East J Street Benicia CA
Parcel number: 89-053-5
known as the Milburn House
historic name: Lewis Decatur Sanborn House
a Sanborn family member sold the house to Cornelius Culver in 1914
The two and one-half story rectangular shaped house has a side broken pediment gable roof with a centered front door flanked by double hung windows and three windows on the second story. Each end of the gable has a double hung window at the half story level. The entire building is now covered with stucco. Interior has random width floors and walls of pine. Family traditon states that the house materials were shipped from Sanbornton New Hampshire in the 1850's. The rear two story section is constructed completely of redwood and is in fact a separate house moved to site before 1885.
In 1850 this property was owned by W.A. Gallaer the first Customs Collector at the Port of Benicia. It has long been roumored that Govenor Bigler lived here in 1853-54 but other houses also claim this distinction. Lewis Decatur Sanborn first came to California in 1849 and returned with his bride in 1853 on Pacific Mail Steamship Tennessee which went aground in Bolinas Bay. Mr. L.D. Sanborn was a carpenter by trade.Collection
Benicia Architectural Study - 1989
