Santa Cruz History ~ The Little Red Church

please note: cw//suicide - historical accounts

my pic of Little Red Church, Summer 2021

At the beginning of July, I was part of another play written and produced by Santa Cruz playwright Dana Bagshaw and directed by Matt Mathews. "Empty Chair" is a new play written about the founders of Calvary Episcopal Church in downtown Santa Cruz.  This church is one of the oldest churches in Santa Cruz, and was discussed heavily in Dana Bagshaw's play I was in last summer, La Boheme Santa Cruz. (There is a whole series of posts I made about the historical characters from that play that you can find in the following links: Carmelita Cottages Part 1, Captain Dame Part 2, Lottie Thompson Part 3, Henry Thompson Part 4, Carmelita Cottages Part 5.)

Also known as the Little Red Church, Calvary Episcopal Church is a prominent centerpiece of downtown Santa Cruz. Even without knowing much about the history of Santa Cruz, the church attracts attention of people passing by with its red color and beautiful Gothic Revival Style architecture. 

 Poster designed by Jay Topping.

 

 

 

 

 Calvary Episcopal Church's design is credited to Joseph Boston(1824-1874), modeled after a church found in Lancashire, England.(source) The church held its first service on January 8, 1865.(source) Margaret Koch, a Santa Cruz Sentinel Staff Writer, wrote on Friday, June 16, 1972, that Calvary Episcopal Church is the "oldest known church building in continuous use in California". It was the first building in Santa Cruz County to receive a "'new bronze'" plague from the California Heritage Council for "its authentic and interesting architecture." Before the church was built, the services were held in an "'old flea-infested school house'," and apparently they also held services in courtrooms and a local community center, but things needed to change when a theater group that used the same community center began using their sacred items as props for rehearsals.(source) I am attaching in this article a screenshot of the newspaper clipping, which also states that the land on which Calvary Episcopal Church was built was donated by Eliza Boston herself, "wife of Joseph Boston, pioneer Santa Cruz settlers." (source) 

An article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel from June 16, 1972

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The same staff writer Margaret Koch would later publish another section on the Calvary Episcopal Church on January 18, 1976, entitled "Oldest Church Building in Santa Cruz." Here, Koch writes that the church was a desolate looking place in 1876, painted the color white and placed seemingly into "an unpopulated countryside". It was built in 1864, "due mainly to the determination of one small and slender woman. This page today seems to be devoted to small determined women, and Mrs. Joseph Boston certainly would fit that description if she were alive now." In this article, we discover that Eliza Bull came to California to her brother, a banker in San Francisco, in 1861, because her parents feared for her health. In a year, Eliza was married to Joseph Boston, the wedding taking place at the First Congregational Church of Santa Cruz. At that time, Joseph Boston was operating a store Boston&Williams in Monterey, and then in Santa Cruz when he moved. In Santa Cruz, Joseph Boston began working in the tannery business, teaming with Kirby and Jones (Jones being Edmund Jones; Kirby being Richard Kirby. Kirby's wife, Georgiana Bruce Kirby, was a suffragette, author, schoolteacher, and activist. She was an active member of the anti-slavery movement. Georgiana Bruce Kirby Preparatory School in Santa Cruz is named in her honor.) The church struggled with paying their rectors' salaries, and would use pew rents to cover those, and even resorted to renting out the land around the church to a farmer who raised potatoes and alfalfa. In 1902, pew rents were discontinued, and the church was still struggling after all those years. Joseph Boston, who had been the secretary for the Parish, had passed away by then, and the "financial equilibrium" was only restored after World War II when Reverend Norman H. Snow stepped in.(source) Unfortunately, I am unable to find information on how exactly Rev. Snow acted, but the information was included in Koch's article in the Santa Cruz Sentinel from 1976. 

 In another newspaper clipping from December 25, 1938, Robert E. Burton writes about the "churchiest church in Santa Cruz," Calvary Episcopal Church. In this article, Burton writes about the vestrymen who physical built the church, under Joseph Boston's "architectural genius and prime moving spirit." Burton writes about Joseph Boston:

Although a tanner by trade, Boston was, nevertheless, somewhat of an amateur artist and surely a lover of the beautiful and symmetrical. He surrounded himself with books and histories on architecture written in English, French and Spanish; being conversant in all these languages, and made a study of them. He moreover had the advantage of an early education in France and England where he became in contact with the finest examples of architecture. His advent in California during the early 50's, first at Monterey, then in Santa Cruz, was to prove most beneficial to Santa Cruz. His tannery was located on what is known as the Boston tract, on Mission Hill where Davis street now runs. (source)

 Together, Eliza and Joseph had five children, Alice M. Boston (1863-1888), William Trowbridge Boston (1865-1871), Elizabeth W. Boston (1870-1946), Beatrice Boston (1873-1941), and Agnes Howard Boston (1875-1955). In "The Bostons: A Pioneer Family of Santa Cruz County," Dana Bagshaw writes that Joseph Boston took his own life on October 17, 1874, leaving Eliza with three daughters. Unfortunately, I cannot gain access to Dana Bagshaw's article in Do You Know My Name?, a MAH Publication on the history of Santa Cruz County. But on the Santa Cruz MAH website, it says that their eldest daughter had also potentially taken her own life, and Eliza's brother - I'm assuming the banker from San Francisco - was institutionalized for insanity. As far as I understand from talking to Dana Bagshaw during our rehearsal process, Joseph Boston was devastated after an accident that happened at the tannery in 1871, which took the life of his first-born son, William Trowbridge Boston, three years before Joseph's death. 

Based on numerous newspaper clippings, the Bostons' daughter Beatrice Boston sang somewhat regularly in the area; on July 28, 1903, Beatrice sang Handel's "Come Unto Me," from The Messiah at the Calvary Episcopal Church.(source) On June 30, 1904, Beatrice sang "Be of Good Comfort, He Calleth Thee" once again for the Calvary Episcopal Church.(source) And in 1906, she sang at the Fireman's Hall in Boulder Creek. The clipping states that "Miss Beatrice Boston sang 'There, Little Girl, Don't Cry," in a manner that brought down the house and responded to an enthusiastic encore." (source)  Her singing might have come from her mother's love of singing, because for the first years of the church's existence, Eliza Boston not only sang in the choir herself but also directed it.     

Both Eliza and Joseph Boston were two of the four characters featured in Dana Bagshaw's play. But there were two more people featured in the play who were present during the early years of the church's development . The play, written for the church's Founders Day, was inspired by a recent discovery by Scott's Valley historian Jay Topping that a woman named Agnes Scott was one of Calvary's original church members in 1861. And with this discovery, Agnes Scott and her husband, Hiram Scott, both entered the plot of the story. (Jay Topping actually ended up playing Hiram Scott in the play and I played Agnes!) 

Silver Mountain City, 1860-1870. Photo sent by Jay Topping.

Agnes Scott, then Cumming, was born on February 14, 1831 in Ontario, Canada. Apparently she was an avid reader, and also liked to stay aware of the latest fashion. She moved to Santa Cruz in 1859, when she was 28 years old, working as a dressmakers and tailor. She met Hiram Scott and married him in San Jose on August 11, 1861. They lived in Scott's Valley, in the Scott House that Hiram built in 1853. They had William Nelson Scott(1862-1935) in 1862, who was the first baby baptized at the Calvary Episcopal Church on May 10, 1863. In 1863, The Scotts moved to Silver Mountain City in the Sierra Nevada, where Hiram established the Eureka Gold and Silver Mining Company and the Mammoth Gold and Silver Mining Company. While at Silver Mountain, they had their two daughters, Anna Frances "Birdie" Scott Ford (1866-1932), and Nancy Maude Scott(1868-1946). The mines were unsuccessful, and the family returned to Santa Cruz in 1869, moving into Agnes' brother's house, William Cumming, on what is now called Cedar street. This home was located close to the Calvary Episcopal Church. Richard Stauff writes about the years at Silver Mountain:

The years at Silver Mountain were hard ones for Agnes. The snow filled winters, the rough miners, & the lack of culture must all have taken their toll. Hiram, too, had suffered through the losses he incurred. After years of fantastic good fortune and success, he found it very difficult to accept defeat, especially after working so hard and sinking most of his resources into the mines. (source)

The ruthless conditions at Silver Mountain were described in some detail in Dana Bagshaw's play, and I even received some photographs from Jay Topping which I have attached in this article. The conditions were poor and difficult for both the men working the mines and their women, who were having children and taking care of them. The available photographs are effective in demonstrating the kind of conditions Agnes endured for years while Hiram worked the mines.  

Hiram Scott

Alpine Company Miners, sent by Jay Topping

Then in 1874, Douglas Cumming, another one of Agnes' brothers, came from the southwest and informed Hiram of the natural resources and mineral wealth found on the Arizona Territory. Hiram was in, but Agnes refused to go and stayed in Santa Cruz with their children. By 1880, their son William joined his father Hiram in Arizona, while Agnes stayed in Santa Cruz with their two daughters. Hiram built a home in Pheonix, near Salt River, by 1881, and by 1885, he bought a saloon business in Casa Grande. During all these years, Hiram would send money to Agnes back in Santa Cruz. However, in the winter of 1885, Hiram became ill and died in March of 1886. His burial site is unknown. Hiram died a little over a year after his 22 year-old son's marriage to Edith Lemon Barter, a 29 year-old divorcee with three children of her own from a previous marriage. In Spring of 1889, their baby William Douglas died of diphtheria, and in July of the same year, Edith had another son with the same name. Their marriage fell apart when one of Edith's children from her previous marriage, Homer Nelson, drowned in the mill pond right before his 7th birthday. In 1892, Edith and William separated and then divorced in 1896. (source)  

Agnes Scott

When Agnes was 89 years-old, the 19th Amendment was ratified in the U.S. and Agnes' granddaughter, Susan Ford, asked Agnes if she was excited to vote. "'Grandma sat up very straight in her wheelchair,' Susan said, and declared, 'I am a subject of the King of England.'" (source) 

Agnes died in 1923 in her bed at the same home she lived in for more than fifty years. She had just celebrated her 92nd birthday seven days before. The home was torn down in 1925, two years after her death.

Dana Bagshaw's play, with a cast of 4 people (Shannon Casey as Eliza Boston, Joshua Hughes as Joseph Boston, Jay Topping as Hiram Scott, and Rubina Mazurka (me!) as Agnes Scott + Nicolette Nasr from La Boheme Santa Cruz reprising the role of Ellen Thomson) took on a broad narrative, covering these people's lives from Eliza and Joseph's marriage up to Eliza and Agnes' later years. Performing the play at the Calvary Episcopal Church in Santa Cruz was wonderful, allowing people in the audience to enter the church after the play for a tour of the historical landmark.    

 

Here we are posing as the characters during rehearsals for Dana Bagshaw's play. Left to right: Joshua Hughes as Joseph Boston, Shannon Casey as Eliza Boston, Rubina Mazurka as Agnes Scott, and Jay Topping as Hiram Scott. 

Now you can watch the filmed play, edited by Shannon Casey.