Presenting The Golden Gate Villa: Crown Jewel of Santa Cruz

"From any portion of the city can be seen a magnificent villa whose turrets and towers soar above their surroundings." Thus begins an 1891 account in the Santa Cruz Daily Sentinel of the "various architectural beauties of Golden Gate Villa," then under construction on Beach Hill in Santa Cruz, California. Modern judgment concurs. Renowned architectural historian and critic David Gebhard identifies the three-story, Queen Anne-style beauty as "visually the most prominent Victorian in Santa Cruz," and John Chase, in his Sidewalk Companion to Santa Cruz Architecture, calls the 30-room Villa "the most lavishly ornamented house in Santa Cruz." For more than a hundred years, passers-by have paused to wonder at the romantic mansion, which stands as a fitting monument to the lavish era in which it was built.

Stepping inside, you are not disappointed. A graceful, sea-blue dome embellished with gold arches high in the wood-ribbed ceiling of the entry hall, creating a sense of sanctuary. Evidence shows the artistic painting of the dome is original, it has never been repainted.

You may notice how the stained glass jewels in the transom above the front door reflect in the mirrored mantle of the reception hall fireplace. The Villa's seven ceramic and onyx-faced fireplaces , each with intricately carved frames and mantles of various exotic woods, are a fascinating feature of the Villa, as are the 20 Tiffany-quality stained glass windows throughout the house. Many of the formal rooms are enhanced by stained glass motifs that symbolize their purpose: a cornucopia of fruit above the massive plate glass window in the dining room; violin and trumpet gracing the music room transom; pool players studying their shot in the billiard room. A rounded bedroom in the front tower contains a noted art nouveau bathroom window of water lilies shimmering on an opalescent pond.

The gold parlor, said to be modeled after a room in le Palais de Versailles, features an elaborate frieze band of mythological figures in gilded bas relief. Several of the rooms retain their original gold-plated chandeliers , prudently fitted with gas jets in addition to being wired for the new luxury of electricity. Other rooms are lit with carved alabaster bowl lights that cast a flattering glow. Throughout the house, redwood wainscoting is meticulously hand "combed" with an artistic grain and lintels, balustrades and moldings are elaborately hand carved. The formal rooms on the ground floor are divided by wide French doors that can be thrown open to create one grand stage for entertaining. The glass doors were added in 1912, some of the original pocket doors are still in place within the walls.

Lighting the broad curved staircase to the second floor is the masterpiece and soul of the house, a cathedral window containing a near-life-sized stained glass portrait of a young woman in ancient dress, amidst artistically-cut stained glass jewels. The portrait is thought to depict Agnes McLaughlin, daughter of family who built the Villa. Legend has it that some of her golden hair was mixed in the color of the glass, to give the true shade. In honor of its centennial, the window underwent a thorough restoration in 1990.

Major Frank McLaughlin, an early partner of Thomas Edison and personal friend of Teddy Roosevelt, was a noted mining engineer and prominent figure in California state politics. (More about the Family History) He commissioned San Francisco architect Thomas J. Welsh to design his mansion in the seaside resort of Santa Cruz, where his family had summered for several years. Welsh, best known for his cathedrals, was the architect of Holy Cross in Santa Cruz and many significant San Francisco churches destroyed in the 1906 earthquake, including the first St. Mary's. His illustrious career has been lovingly documented by his great grand-daughter, Patricia Welsh. The Major instructed his architect to "spare no expense in making Golden Gate Villa the showplace of Santa Cruz."

"The Sea, The Sand, the Surf, and the Salubrious Mountains," is how publicists praised Santa Cruz during the gay 1890s. A pamphlet put out by the town in 1892 proudly claimed, "Today it is famous as a watering place, leading in popularity and patronage all the other resorts of the Pacific coast. This city is celebrated for flowers--a veritable bouquet; sea bathing--one of the finest beaches in the world...and scenery--grand in the extreme of sea, bay, lowlands, hillsides, and forests and mountains in the distance." Those who visit Santa Cruz in 2007 will recognize the accuracy of the claims. In 1895, the city celebrated its first Venetian Water Carnival, a spectacular show of flower-decked river barges that foreshadowed today's Begonia Festival water parade.

The building site selected for the Villa was described in the local press as "one of the most beautiful among the many lovely ones Santa Cruz affords... Its location on the north bluff of Beach Hill looks out across the city to the terraces and foothills which rise into the curving range of the Santa Cruz Mountains... the beach and Bay, but a short distance southward, will lie in sight from the balconies of the new house." It has been suggested that McLaughlin named his Villa after one of his mining ventures, but the reverse is more likely true: a "Golden Gate Cottage" which the McLaughlins occupied for several seasons stood on the spot before the Major purchased the site and constructed his own home.

Contemporary accounts praised the lightness and variety of the Villa's design, incorporating verandas and balconies particularly suited to Santa Cruz's mild climate. The third floor belvedere, later enclosed as an artistic penthouse, offers a vista of sea and mountains. The house has a two full and one half towers; the main tower was the highest point in Santa Cruz at the time of the Villa's completion. The rear facade, made up almost equally of glass, wall and roof space, descends the steep slope of Beach Hill. An ivy-draped walkway to the town below winds through terraces supported by fortress-like stone walls, built by skilled masons McLaughlin employed to supervise work on his impressive dam project in Oroville.

Visitors arrived at a grand carriage entrance on the east face of the house. Since converted to a studio, this portico is still identified by a finely carved carriage wheel on the lintel seen from the reception hall. A two-story, turreted carriage house in keeping with the style of the Villa, now offering spacious living quarters, retains its turntable for carriages, akin to those used to turn the cable cars of San Francisco.

The house was constructed by the building firm of Swain & Hudson of Marysville (Yuba County), California, for a cost estimated by the local newspaper at $25,000, with completion of the grounds, retaining walls and terraces requiring not less than $10,000 additional, an astronomical figure at a time when the finest homes in Santa Cruz sold for about $6,000. "A decided ornament to Santa Cruz," was the verdict of the local press.

By the time the McLaughlins took up residence in 1892, it was clear that the Villa had been created to delight and entertain. Frequent front-page newspaper columns detailed festivities at the mansion on Beach Hill:

During the summer of 1892, the mansion opened its impressive portals to Governor Markham and his staff, who had arrived to inspect the summer encampment of the state militia in Santa Cruz. Refreshments were served while the First Infantry band played on the Villa's belvedere. The following year the Major held a memorable Fourth of July reception in honor of the yachtsmen of the "Aggie." Miss McLaughlin rendered several vocal selections, while the courtly Major astonished the company by his marvelous mind-reading feats. Dancing was indulged in to the music of the phonograph, and the evening culminated in a fireworks display.

On May Day of 1897, the Villa hosted one of its most spectacular celebrations -- a fancy dress ball deemed "part of the social history of the state." After being received in the formal gold room, the surprised guests were led in a grand march to the carriage house for a barn dance, a new fad from the East Coast, where it was "all the rage at Newport." The "barn" had been transformed by banks of evergreen, Chinese lanterns, hanging flower baskets, and Oriental draperies. Major McLaughlin masqueraded as a French chef, and Agnes was declared to be "indescribably pretty" dressed as May Day, in a costume of pink silk with baby's cap and shepherd's crook. It was noted that she often carried a bunch of violets (as she does in her portrait at the Villa.)

"New Year's Eve is always an important event at Golden Gate Villa, for it is celebrated with all the magnificent hospitality for which Major and Mrs. Frank McLaughlin are noted," the Santa Cruz Sentinel confided on January 1, 1898. The family displayed a European flair to welcome in the year, donning costumes and portraying scenes through the new French medium of tableaus vivants. The billiard room doorway was draped in dark satin to provide a "frame" for scenes such as "A New Year's Poster," portrayed by Miss McLaughlin, "Guess Who Has Just Been Kissed," by Mrs. McLaughlin and friends, "The Coming Woman," by Miss McLaughlin and several young ladies, and "Mlle. Boniface, the Circus Rider," depicted by no other than Mr. Edison. The press declared Miss McLaughlin "the ideal American girl," looking as if she had indeed stepped from one of Gibson's famous posters. The performers and audience were regaled with one of the Major's famous terrapin suppers. Dinner at the Villa was served on the family's fabulous silver service, for which a fireproof, walk-in vault was constructed off the butler's pantry.

It must have come as a disappointment to the local townspeople that few of them were ever invited to the Villa. The McLaughlins appear to have largely ignored their neighbors in drawing up their sophisticated guest lists.

Celebrated visitors at the Villa included Thomas Edison and his nephew Con, who organized the first moving picture ever shown in Santa Cruz at the Villa, newspaper publisher M. H. de Young, before he and the Major clashed over the San Francisco Chronicle's coverage of a hot election, "Boss" Abe Ruef, also prominent in San Francisco politics of the era, sugar king Claus Spreckles, and Duke Kalakaua of the Sandwich Islands, who introduced surfing in Santa Cruz. The McLaughlins also dined with firearms heiress Sarah Winchester, who was building her own mysterious mansion in San Jose, among numerous other luminaries of the time.

As chair of the California Republican Party, McLaughlin became friends with Teddy Roosevelt, who visited at the Villa , where one of the guest rooms is named in his honor. It is said that the leather which once covered the dining room walls was African elephant hide bagged by President Roosevelt and presented to the Major in gratitude for his political exertions.

The Villa figured prominently in California politics during 1906, when a photograph of a celebratory dinner in its leather-walled dining room was published in papers throughout the state as evidence of an unholy alliance between the Southern Pacific Railroad "political bureau" and gubernatorial nominee James Gillett.

After McLaughlin's death in 1907, the house was inherited by Mrs. McLaughlin's sister Mrs. Terheune, but continued its hospitable role, serving as a clubhouse for his fellow Elks, to whom the Major had willed his wine cellar and his fine cigar collection. The Villa was purchased in 1912 by Lucian Sly, builder of the exclusive Stanford Court apartments on San Francisco's Nob Hill. Sly updated the Villa with massive plate-glass picture windows in the gold parlor and dining room, and replaced the original pocket doors between the downstairs rooms with French doors. He also removed a wall that divided McLaughlin's den in the front tower and added a Beaux Arts fireplace to what became known as the ballroom.

In the lean times of the 1930s, the Villa changed hands several times, and the second floor was partitioned into apartments. However, the changes have been slight, utilizing removable partitions, and do not detract from the integrity of the major formal rooms.

  The house opened to the public during the 1940s and '50s as the restaurant Palais Monte Carlo, described in travel guides as "unrivaled among Pacific resorts." Locally the inn is fondly recalled as a gathering place for patriarchs of the Italian families who ran the fishing industry on the Santa Cruz wharf. The marinara sauce was good and stiff drinks were poured at a bar decorated in the suits of playing cards. In 1963, Beverly Hills multi-millionaire William W. Durney, owner of Carnation Seafood, and his wife Dorothy Kingsley, a noted Hollywood screenwriter, bought the house. They soon passed it on to Patricia Sambuck Wilder, who has owned the Villa since 1967, a longer term than any previous proprietor.

Like her romantic Villa, which became known as "Patty's Palace," Ms. Wilder carries a lively past; she once dined with Howard Hughes, and was crowned 'Miss Gilroy Rodeo' about the time Marilyn Monroe reigned as first queen of the Artichoke Festival in neighboring Castroville. Later, she modeled at I. Magnin in San Francisco, turning the heads of the some of the city's most eligible men.

Despite the Villa's eventful history, many of the original fixtures and furnishings remain in use, just as Welsh's original floor plan is preserved remarkably intact, still offering a grand stage for entertaining. Those who visit today may hang their hat and cane on the Major's oak and velvet coat stand in the reception hall. You encounter Agnes's haunting stained glass portrait on the staircase landing, and water lilies shimmer in the bathroom window of her upstairs bedroom. Dinner is still served on plates from the walk-in vault off the butler's pantry, and one of the valuable paintings McLaughlin chose for his den hangs above the fireplace there: a bowl of golden roses by a noted artist whose work is still increasing in worth, it points to soundness of the Major's taste.

In recognition of Ms. Wilder's dedicated restoration at the Villa, the house has been honored by the California Heritage Council for outstanding preservation, and received a landmark plaque from the Santa Cruz County Historical Trust and a SCOPE (Santa Cruz Organization for Progress and Euthenics) award.

In 1975, the Golden Gate Villa was entered into the National Register of Historic Places. She continues to reign as the Crown Jewel of Santa Cruz.