A hearty welcome to our new BUNNIN CHEVROLET dealership.

Bunnin Chevrolet of Fillmore opened August 14, 2020. This is Leo Bunnin's third Chevrolet dealership. The others are Bunnin Chevrolet and Cadillac in Santa Barbara, Bunnin Chevrolet in Santa Paula (opened November 2019) and now Fillmore. Due to covid restrictions, no date has been set for the official grand opening party, but everyone is welcome to stop by and look at the newly renovated showroom, complete with the newest Chevrolet models on display, including the all new Chevrolet Corvette, coming soon.

Bunnin's goal is to reopen the dealership's Cafe as soon as possible and safe to do so. It will be called LEO's Cafe and will include breakfast and lunch favorites that Fillmore residents were used to.

Leo Bunnin is a third generation car dealer whose family has been in the automobile business for over 70 years, and "we salute the Morris family who started this dealership in 1929. We plan to give "back to the community" which has been a long standing business credo for Leo Bunnin and his dealerships. We are so happy and proud to be your new hometown dealership and look forward to seeing everyone here whether it be for Service, Parts, Sales (new and used as well as medium to heavy duty trucks)."

Leo Bunnin - Owner and Dealer Principal.

David W. Rowlands, Fillmore City Manager.

The City Council of Fillmore wants your input. The City, working with the Conflict Resolution Institute, will be hosting a virtual Community Conversation, on Saturday, September 26 from 10:00 am to 11:30 am. Small break out groups will be used and we will have English and Spanish language groups and interpreters. You may participate via phone or computer.

The community conversation is designed to see how the community feels, highlight specific experiences, and understand what the next steps envision. The City Council is committed to making life better for everyone in the community. The only way that the City Council can know your experiences and thoughts is through your participation.

To register for this event the link is, https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-city-of-fillmore-virtual-community-conv...

Registration is also available on the following city social media platforms – city web page, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

Let’s work together to keep Fillmore the “Best Last Small Town.”

Piru in 1906. The Ventura County Cooperative which would become United Mercantile, Piru Billiards, and the Piru Post Office.
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Ideal Billiard and Barbershop Ad from April 24, 1930.
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Courtesy Fillmore Historical Museum

In 1930 and 31, the Piru News ran a series of articles entitled, “What Piru Has….” The paper described the series as “a series of weekly articles describing the various industries, products, organizations, schools, business houses of Piru and vicinity.” Two of the issues addressed the business that were in Piru. Below is the first of the two articles.
You can read more of the Piru News at https://cdnc.ucr.edu/
Piru News, Volume IV, Number 40, 13 November 1930

PIRU BUSINESS Part 1
Piru has a bank, a drugstore, four grocery stores, six gasoline filling stations, and garages, a furniture store, a general store selling almost every article in common use. a gent’s furnishings and notions store, three combined barbershop and pool rooms, two restaurants and other smaller businesses.

The Bank of America, a branch institution until last week under the name Bank of Italy, has been operating as a part of the great banking chain since February 8 when it was taken over from the Fillmore State Bank. The state bank started here in June 1918 as a branch of the Fillmore institution. In good times deposits at the local bank have reached a total of $350,000. Owing to business depression deposits just now are under that figure. The bank was started as a one-man affair by W. L. Ramsay who operated it for six months. Clyde E. Spencer then took charge and managed it for three years when he resigned to enter the real estate business. James Brady is the present manager and is assisted by Leo Sheffield. teller. Brady declares that all charges for various transactions are unusually low at the local bank. The bank owns its own building, a neat brick structure at Center and Main streets.

The Drugstore: An up-to-date drugstore carrying a complete line of articles usually sold in a modern pharmacy is operated by E. C. Brehm, who has been in the drug business for 31 years and who has been a registered pharmacist 24 years. A large line of soft drinks and ice cream concoctions are sold at the soda fountain. All kinds of drugs, drug sundries, patent medicines, toilet articles, stationery, clocks, magazines, etc., are sold here. Brehm makes a specialty of filling prescriptions. The owner came here three years ago and about a year ago built the red brick structure that houses the store. The business was purchased from A. L, Wilkie, who gave Piru its first drugstore on November 25, 1925. Brehm has been a druggist in Missouri, Kansas and Texas.

Situated beside the bank is the Ideal Billiard Parlor and Barbershop of T. H. Green who built the brick structure in which the business is housed four years ago after operating in another structure for three years. Two barber chairs and a soft drink, tobacco and cigar counter are located in the front room. In the rear there are two pool tables and two snooker tables which usually are kept busy especially of evenings.

Macy’s Grocery Store, operated by Mrs. Laura Macy and her son, Les, stands beside Green’s barbershop and is housed in a brick building erected by the Macys about the same time the barbershop structure was built and is the same size. The business is one of the Blue & White stores, which means that it is owned locally by an Independent dealer but that goods are purchased from the Blue & White concern.

A high-grade line of groceries, canned goods, fruits, some vegetables. cigars, tobaccos and candies are handled here.

The Macys took over the store seven years ago from T. T. Kirkham who operated across the street, where Mrs. Delis Trotter now has a furniture store. The grocery enjoys a large trade from both the town and country people.

Cornelius Store: W. G. Cornelius operates the next store down the street in conjunction with the post office. Everything from post cards to radios and from clocks to overalls are sold in this store but especially gents furnishings, notions, confectionery, cigars, magazines and tobacco.

Cornelius built the store building this year. It is a neat stucco structure with cement floor and is one of the coolest places in town on hot summer days. The proprietor has been in business here ten years.

At one time in partnership with Hugh Warring, he started a store in the Buckhorn district, had one in Piru and later bought a third here and started what was known as the Ventura Cooperative association. Cornelius managed the three stores until his health failed. For a time after coming to Piru. he had a health resort in Lechler canyon, but this was destroyed by fire and a flood,

The Piru Furniture Store, operated by Mrs. Delia Trotter, had a unique beginning. Mrs. Trotter says that she and her husband had so many household articles that they did not know where to keep them. These things were stored in their garage and everywhere possible. One day she had a bright idea. She suggested that if her husband would put a floor in the garage, she would open a secondhand furniture store and sell the belongings.

This proposal was carried out at once and “things went like hot cakes," Mrs. Trotter said, because there were so many oil workers in town then. The neighbors took advantage of the opportunity and bought furniture and other articles they didn’t want, and Mrs. Trotter sold them.

After that Mrs. Trotter went into the business in earnest. She moved into her brick building on Center street and has increased her stock to include both new and used furniture, kitchen utensils, dishes, rugs, etc. Her store is now in its fourth year.

To be continued...

Marie Wren

Piru, CA – It’s a small, cozy room—only about 200 square feet—but without question is one of Ventura County’s most valuable hidden gems. The Rancho Camulos Museum Research Library, located in the museum’s 1920 adobe restored house facing Highway 126, is home to a variety of historic treasures, including rare books, an extensive collection of books on Southern California history, historical photos, maps and documents dating from the nineteenth century. The library and its archival collection is complemented by a treasure trove of early nineteenth and eighteenth-century artifacts original to the property.

Museum volunteers and staff recently completed cataloguing the museum’s collection of books and several of its most significant archival collections. To honor this milestone, the museum’s board of directors earlier this month named the research library in honor of Fillmore resident Marie Wren, who served as a charter volunteer for the National Historic Landmark’s and the non-profit’s first docent council chair more than twenty years ago. More recently Wren donated more than 200 books from her personal collection on Southern California, California and American West history and fiction to the library. Wren also made a handsome donation to Rancho Camulos that enabled the museum to purchase shelving, furnishings, and archival supplies, creating a comfortable working space for researchers and the museum’s archival staff.

“Without Marie’s dedication to Rancho Camulos Museum, her support of our research library and generous donation, we would not have been able to make this happen, notes Dr. Susan Falck, the museum’s executive director. “She is truly an inspiration to everyone who works on behalf of this museum. Her passion for California history and Rancho Camulos history is contagious.”

Prior to the creation of the museum library and research center, much of the museum’s artifacts and archival materials lay scattered among several rooms and buildings on the twelve-acre museum grounds. In early 2014, volunteers began gathering these materials for safekeeping. Once the 1920 adobe was restored it became possible to begin cataloging and conserving numerous documents and artifacts. Dianne Cox, who has served as a museum volunteer for 13 years, led this sizable undertaking and has put countless hours into creating a comfortable, well-organized workspace, meticulously cleaning and conserving fragile items and later helping to catalogue the materials along with Falck and museum board member Meredith McGowan, who works as a professional librarian for Los Angeles County. "Working with Marie in the library, sorting and cataloging her books, and listening to her stories, was a wonderful experience for me,” notes Cox. “It was obvious she loved her books and she loved history".

Wren, a native of Oklahoma who moved to Fillmore in 1947, joined the museum as a volunteer shortly after the 1994 Northridge Earthquake severely damaged several buildings at Rancho Camulos. She has served as one of the museum’s strongest advocates over the years, helping raise funds to restore the museum’s 19th-century buggy and other projects, recruiting new volunteers, developing the museum’s tour program and uncovering the history of Camulos Ranch by steadily acquiring books about rancho and Southern California history. Recently, a collection of vignettes Wren wrote about local families and events that appeared in local newspapers was published as Stories to Be Told: Tales about the pioneer people and places in little Santa Clara River valley, Southern California.

Over the past several years Rancho Camulos has opened its collection to scholars from Yale University, UC Berkeley, Loyola Marymount and Cal State graduate students eager to learn more about the rancho era in Southern California and the families and laborers who established and operated one of the oldest and most successful agricultural operations in Ventura County. The museum also periodically loans out items from its collection to other institutions. Currently, the Smithsonian’s Museum of American History is showcasing several religious artifacts from Rancho Camulos in an exhibit entitled “Many Voices, One Nation.” Once the pandemic has subsided, the museum looks forward to once again making its research collection accessible to the public, according to Falck. “In the meantime, we continue organizing our collection and uncovering new treasures.”

To learn more about the Rancho Camulos Museum research library, email info@ranchocamulos.org or visit the museum’s website at www.ranchocamulos.org.