For longtime residents, a trip down the Conejo Grade can stir memories of fields of lima beans, barley, corn and walnut orchards that once dotted the valley floor below.
Those thoughts were awakened again this week when a 4.5-mile stretch of Highway 101 in Camarillo — from the top of the Conejo Grade to Lewis Road — was officially designated the Adolfo Camarillo Memorial Highway by state lawmakers.
The resolution was shepherded through the Legislature by Assemblywoman Audra Strickland, R-Moorpark, at the request of the nonprofit Camarillo Ranch Foundation.
Adolfo Camarillo, the city’s namesake, was a prominent horse breeder, rancher and philanthropist. He ran Camarillo Ranch — originally a 10,000-acre Spanish land grant — for nearly 70 years, assuming control at age 16 following the death of his father, Juan, in 1880.
One of his most lasting visual legacies is the three-story ranch house he built in 1892. Visible from Highway 101, the Victorian Queen Anne-style home — now run by the foundation — plays host to community events, weddings and other civic gatherings.
Mr. Camarillo’s generosity also included donating large portions of his land — for the city’s first high school, for the building of railroad tracks, for the expansion of St. John’s Seminary and for the building of the Conejo Grade — that enabled the city to grow and prosper.
The job of the foundation will now be to raise money and arrange with Caltrans to erect the memorial signs along that segment of Highway 101.
The designation is truly a fitting way to further recognize the life and contributions of a man often called “The Last Spanish Don.”