Santa Paula High School Fire Investigation

On Sunday morning 11/27/22, at about 12:42 a.m., a structure fire was reported at the Santa Paula High School. Firefighters responded to the scene and have since extinguished the fire. The Santa Paula Unified School District announced that school will be cancelled for Santa Paula High School students on Monday and Tuesday, November 28th-29th. The incident is under investigation by investigators from the Ventura County Fire Dept. and Santa Paula Police Dept.

Anyone who may have information pertaining to the fire is urged to call the Santa Paula Police Department at (805) 525-4474 or Detective Shawn Virani at (805) 525-4474 ext. 220. Anyone who wishes to remain anonymous may call Ventura County Crime Stoppers at 1-800-222-TIPS. The Santa Paula Police Department has also established a secure database to collect footage from security cameras or surveillance videos. If you have information or video(s) to share, please notify the Police Department and email SPCrimeInfo@spcity.org.

Also, the Santa Paula Unified School District is offering a WeTip telephone number to report any information: (844) 805-2659.

Join us on Twitter @SP_Police, Instagram @SantaPaulaPoliceDepartment, FaceBook – Santa Paula Police Department and with Nixle by texting your zip code to 888777 to receive local law enforcement and public safety alerts and advisories.

The Fillmore Fire Department in conjunction with the Fillmore Fire Foundation is kicking off the annual Holiday Toy Drive this week. Collection drop off boxes for new toys are available at the Fillmore Police and Fire Stations. As part of the Toy Drive, on Sunday, December 4th, the Fire Foundation will be holding the annual Chicken Dinner Fundraiser to collect donations that will used to purchase hundreds of toys for children in the Fillmore/Piru area. A complete chicken dinner meal is prepared for anyone wanting to donate fifteen dollars ($15)that will be used to purchase a new toy. Because of on-going COVID-19 precautions, all meals will be for take-out only and will be available via a contactless drive-thru process,this year the dinner will be held at the Fillmore/Piru Veteran’s Memorial Building, 511 Second St. Dinner will be served from 5-7 PM.In lieu of a $15 donation, a new toy valued at $15 or greater may be donated. The hundreds of toys purchased from this event will be combined with those that are donated by the Community and then distributed on Saturday, December 17th, from 9AM-12 PM at a huge Community Holiday Giveaway event.If you would like to donate to the Toy Drive/Community Giveaway or would like to purchase tickets/drop off toys, please call 805-815-0328.

1st place winner was Celeste Camarena of FMS; she will be entered in the regional competition with a chance to go to State.
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Lion’s Club member Scott Lee with Patricia Rivera and her mom. Particia won runner-up award for the Lions Club Peace Poster Contest.
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Lion’s Club member Scott Lee with Maria Gallegas. Maria won runner-up award for the Lions Club Peace Poster Contest.
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Every year, Lion’s Club International holds a Peace Poster Contest. The local Fillmore Lion’s Club encourages students to creatively express their ideas about world peace. This year the theme was “Lead with Compassion”. Many students, especially from Fillmore Middle School, entered their artistic renderings. Lion’s Club appreciates the support of classroom teachers, especially Doris Nichols and Megan Baker-Andrade, who help their students not only expand their skills and creativity, but their awareness of the world as well.

The entries were spectacular again this year! Maria Gallegas and Patricia Rivera from Fillmore Middle School both won runner up awards. Celeste Camarena, also from Fillmore Middle School, won first place. Her poster will be entered in the regional competition. If she wins there, her poster will be entered in the state contest, etc. When asked for a comment about her poster, she said, “Compassion is all about how you feel about helping people. Giving them what they need, especially later in life.”

Winning for best group entry were the students in Ms. Megan Baker-Andrade at Fillmore Middle School. Each student received a small cash prize and a certificate. Congratulations Emilio Martinez, Lupyta Castro, Ethan Kaiser, Michael Rico and Whyett Van Kalsbeek. Your entry was truly inspiring!

Lion’s Club sincerely thanks all students who entered for their thoughtful and polished vision for peace. Thank you also teachers and parents for inspiring excellence in our young people.

On Saturday, November 19th the Fillmore Girls Cross Country team competed at the CIF Southern Section Division 4 Cross Country Championships. The meet was run on the historical, and challenging course at Mount San Antonio College. To qualify for State Finals, the Flashes needed to finish among the top 7 teams in a race of 16 teams.

The team was led by sophomore Niza Laureano, who continued to improve throughout this season. Niza finished in 48th place and posted a best time of 19:41.6. Niza was followed by Nataly Vigil 58th in 20:08.4, Andrea Laureano 81st in 21:00.6, Leah Barragan 88th in 21:21.5, Diana Santa Rosa 96th in 21:51.7, Alexandra Martinez 102nd in 22:10.4, and Monique Hurtado 108th in 22:54.5.

In the team competition, Fillmore finished in 13th place out of a 16 team field. The top 7 teams will now move on to the California State Meet.

Elbert Bailey Turner
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Turners Cottage Hotel. 1st in town.
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EB Turner Saloon
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Turners stable turned into Garage.
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Courtesy Fillmore Historical Museum

The following is a first person account of early life at the beginning of settlement of Fillmore found in the archives of the Fillmore Historical Museum.

In April, 1933, an early pioneer in Fillmore, Mr. C. C. Elkins, was interviewed about Fillmore’s early years. He had described the simple boarding house, where his family had first stayed upon their arrival on the railroad, as an “up and down boarded house.”

Mr. and Mrs. Elbert Bailey Turner were also early pioneers here who had settled first in Fillmore and later moved to the Sespe. They had owned and managed that boarding house on what would become Main St. before and after the arrival of the railroad. Life was hard with few conveniences. It took grit to survive and prosper.

Mrs. Turner (Lucinda) who was then living in San Diego took offense to Elkins’ description of her boarding house and expressed her opinion in two letters to the editor, Mr. Wagner, in the April 28th edition of the Fillmore Herald.

In the first letter she recalled some earlier history as follows: “Dear Friend Wagner: I am writing some news which are facts. We are the oldest settlers of Fillmore. I won’t hear to it for any one to take the feather out of our cap and put into theirs. I was always proud of that place. There was a lot of nice old settlers. I think of the nice picnics in Kenney’s grove. I know there are just as fine people now in Fillmore. If there wasn’t they would not be there. We are well. Best wishes for you and Fillmore people and friends.”

In the second letter she described what she and her husband had to do to survive those early years. “Dear Editor: In our home-town paper, the Fillmore Herald, I read that Mr. and Mrs. C.

C. Elkins, Sr. celebrated their 62 wedding anniversary. We wish them health and many more happy anniversaries.

The writer of their affair was mistaken in one instance. One of the shacks as he called it was a California built house 30 X 60, 12 rooms 10 feet high, cloth on walls and papered, neatly furnished and clean and Mrs. E. B. Turner was the manager and cook, with hired help. We also ran a livery stable. We had a paying business but it was hard work with many disadvantages. No meat market, no stores or vegetable wagon every day at your door. Our meat was shipped from Ventura by the Hobson brothers. Easly of Santa Paula furnished most of our vegetables. E. B. Turner butchered a hog now and then and Alfred Stone killed deer. He sold the best part to us. I pickled beef and sides of pork to help out. We had a pen of fat chickens, paid 25 cents for a five or six-pound young rooster, so you can see it was not a fool’s job to take care of our little business.

I add to this that C. C. Elkins family boarded at our place, the Fillmore Hotel, till he could build a temporary place to live in. In a few weeks he began building a two story building with living room and his store on the first floor. It was needed.

E. B. Turner was the first post master of Fillmore. He fixed a front bedroom in our hotel where he took care of the post office for a year or so. Then it was moved to the depot. George Tighe was depot agent and E. B. Turner appointed George Tighe assistant postmaster. Turner said “There wasn’t any money and no honor to work for nothing.” He rented the hotel to George Tighe’s mother for a year.”

“Here are some facts and I want to say the editor in Fillmore in 1887 was a 13 year old boy, a son of Mr. Buckston. The family lived at the old ranch house. The paper was two sheets about 10 X 12 inches. George was a rustler for news. A neighbor by the name of Bill Smith came in the hotel. He said our baby is dead. It was one day old. I haven’t any money to pay for a coffin. I told him I could make one. We had some wide redwood boards. I measured the size and shape on the floor of our back porch. In about an hour I had it finished. I lined it with white cambric and oiled the outside. It was a neat piece of work. I read of a man making his own coffin. It would be time thrown away for me to make mine, for I want to be cremated. Mrs. E. B. Turner”

In October 1933, C.C. Elkins was being interviewed by Charles Jarrett also for the Fillmore Herald. In that interview he also noted that, “Mrs. Turner had taken offence to hearing her little bungalow hotel described as an “up and down boarded house. He emphasized to the interviewer “Don’t call them shacks. I was bawled out for doing that a while back.”

The Turners prospered, moving to a nice two story home on the Sespe. E. B. died September 12, 1936; Mrs. Turner died in June 1945. They had married in Kingman County, Kansas. According to Mrs. Turner, “Ours was the first marriage ceremony ever In Kingman County, Kansas. The justice of the peace was a bit nervous and had to read his book to find out how to tie the knot. It was cold in his dugout office. All he had for fuel was cornstalks. While he was tying the knot his wife broke up corn stalks to keep the place warm.” The Turners came to California on an immigrant train. Coaches were attached to a freight train. They were 10 days making the journey to San Francisco. They then went to Portland by boat, returning to Ventura County by covered wagon.”
They were very representative of the immigrants to the Fillmore, Sespe region. They came to California by wagon, railroad, and boat. They were hardy. They knew what they wanted and achieved their dreams one mile at a time. But their names were not as well-known as the “city fathers” and large farming companies. They were simply the people who made Fillmore grow and prosper by hard work and ingenuity.