Downtown Santa Ana Historic Districts (North, Government/Institutional and South, Retail)

About this property

Downtown Santa Ana is the central district of Santa Ana, California, and the county seat of Orange County, California. It serves as the administrative center for the city and county and contains various retail and commercial businesses. The Downtown Santa Ana Historic Districts are listed with the National Trust for Historic Preservation and consist of numerous historic buildings across the area. The City of Santa Ana was established in 1869 by William Spurgeon on 74.27 acres (300,600 m2) of land purchased from the old Spanish land grant, Rancho Santiago de Santa Ana. The County of Orange was formed in 1889 by William Spurgeon and James McFadden. Santa Ana was chosen as the county seat of government because of its larger growth as a town compared to surrounding towns such as Orange. The Old Orange County Courthouse was built in 1901. The surrounding old town buildings make up the Santa Ana Historical Downtown. City studies and merchant associations generally define Downtown as the area between Ross Street on the west, Minter Street on the east, First Street on the south and Civic Center Drive on the north. Neighborhood organizations define Downtown more narrowly, extending only as far east as Main Street, with the area east of Main part of the Lacy neighborhood; the Santa Ana Regional Transportation Center train and bus station is located at the east end of Lacy along Santiago Avenue. Downtown consists of several sub-districts: an institutional area including the Civic Center, the Artists Village, Calle Cuatro and the East End. Santa Ana Civic Center Plaza (Ross, Civic Center, Santa Ana Blvd, Flower) Santa Ana Public Library (Civic Center Dr. & Ross) Santa Ana Transit Terminal – Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) (Santa Ana Blvd & Ross) Old Orange County Courthouse (Civic Center, Broadway, Sycamore, Santa Ana Blvd.) Orange County Public Law Library (Civic Center Plaza) Ronald Reagan Federal Building and United States Courthouse (4th & Broadway) Fourth District Court of Appeals (Civic Center Plaza on the corner of Santa Ana Blvd & Ross) Office of the District Attorney (Near the corner of Ross & Civic Center) Consulate of Mexico (Near Civic Center & Broadway intersection) Commercial activity in the district is centered on Fourth Street, also known as ''Calle Cuatro''. Fourth Street stretches from the Civic Center in the west. The West End sub-district is bounded by Ross Street, Broadway, and West 4th Street. It contains various dining, entertainment, and retail establishments. The middle section of Calle Cuatro (roughly from Main east to Spurgeon) has retailersThe Rankin Building, 117W Fourth Street at Sycamore, is a historic building that was usually seen as a reminder of when the Downtown Santa Ana was a shopping center, with department stores such as Rankin's, Montgomery Ward (northeast corner of Main, demolished), J. C. Penney (northwest corner of Bush) and Buffums. Eventually, the area lost business to the new malls at Honer Plaza and Santa Ana Fashion Square when they opened in 1958, and later on, to South Coast Plaza.

Location

Categories

Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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