The True Story of Fremont, Foxen and the San Marcos Pass (Evening Lecture)

Our Mission is to inspire meaningful connections to Santa Barbara history.

Santa Barbara Historical Museum

In early December, 1846, “The Pathfinder,” Lt. Col. John C. Frémont, and his recently assembled California Battalion were encamped some 20 miles below Mission San Juan Bautista. Their goal? Head south and liberate Santa Barbara and then Los Angeles from the forces of General José María Flores and claim California for the United States. To do so, for the next twenty-five days Frémont and his men would embark on an historic and nearly comical march of 230 miles culminating in a Christmas Day descent from the Santa Ynez mountains in a torrential rainstorm. According to legend, Benjamin Foxen warned Frémont of a trap at Gaviota Pass and then led Frémont and the battalion safely over the “San Marcos Pass.”

Having assembled diaries, family legends, historic reviews and reminiscences of pure absurdum, and further bolstered by several bottles of courage from the Foxen Winery, join Santa Barbara Historian Neal Graffy for the final, true story of “Frémont, Foxen and the Pass.”

Neal Graffy is a popular local historian. Visit our bookstore and explore his work!

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