Historic Wintersburg, Huntington Beach, CA

Threat: Demolition; Insensitive public policy
Owner: Rainbow Environmental Services

   

     Furuta family bungalow. Photo courtesy Mary Adams Urashima/Historic Wintersburg.

    

      The last remaining pioneer heritage barn in Huntington Beach at Historic Wintersburg. 
      Photo courtesy of Chris Jepsen.

The 1910 building of the Wintersburg Japanese Presbyterian Mission. 

Photo courtesy of Mary Adams Urashima/Historic Wintersburg.

Historic Wintersburg is a Japanese American pioneer property located in north Huntington Beach, Orange County, California.  The approximately five-acre property contains six extant structures: the 1910 Wintersburg Japanese Presbyterian Mission, the 1910 Manse (parsonage), the 1934 Depression-era Wintersburg Japanese Presbyterian Church, the 1912 Furuta family bungalow, the 1947 post-World War II Furuta ranch house, and the Furuta barn, built between 1908 to 1912.

Once a goldfish and flower farm, the property pre-dates California’s Alien Land Law of 1913—prohibiting Japanese immigrant property ownership—and is home to the “oldest Japanese church in Southern California.”  The Mission is part of California’s Japanese Mission Trail, beginning 50 years after the last Spanish Mission, with the work of Dr. Ernest Adolphus Sturge, later presented the Order of the Rising Sun by the Emperor of Japan. The Mission buildings are the oldest surviving Japanese‐American religious structures in Southern California.

Historic Wintersburg was the heart of Orange County’s Japanese community.  The Mission also supported language schools and social activities for the Japanese community around Orange County.  The property was designated by the City of Huntington Beach General Plan as a local landmark in the mid-1970s.  

In November 2013, the City of Huntington Beach approved an amendment to change the existing General Plan land use designation for the Historic Wintersburg property, which is currently owned by Rainbow Environmental Services, a waste disposal company. Although no new development, or active use was proposed, Rainbow Environmental Services also sought approval to demolish, or remove all of the property’s structures. The Wintersburg Preservation Task Force has been given an 18-month window to raise funds to purchase the land, or, failing that, to move the buildings to a new location. In 2014, the National Trust for Historic Preservation added Historic Wintersburg to its 11 Most Endangered Places List.

For more information:

Mary Adams Urashima, Chair
Historic Wintersburg Preservation Task Force
Huntington Beach City Hall
2000 Main Street
Huntington Beach, CA 92648
Email: Mary.Adams.Urashima@gmail.com

Websites: historicwintersburg.blogspot.com and www.huntingtonbeachca.gov/i_want_to/give/donation-wintersburg.cfm