Jim’s Barn
By PAT REEDER
CLAREMORE — Restoring the Santa Monica Ranch, Will Rogers’ home at the time of his death, is a massive undertaking — and a satisfying one, according to Randall Young, associated with the renovation and construction.
“It’s putting back the past … from the ground up,” he said.
A part of that past is a barn, the first structure on the property and commonly called “Jim Rogers Barn.”
In working with the project Young said he “is getting to know Will Rogers, getting down to the ground he was a part of. Every position was built under his direction.”
As the reconstruction on the $5.6 million project began, the first thing was clearing the site of structures built during the park era and returning the ranch to its original footprint.
That includes what has come to be known as the “Jim Rogers Barn” built from lumber taken from the original ranch structure, a mule barn.
The story goes when Will was starting to plan the layout of the newly acquired Santa Monica Mountains ranch there was extensive grading. Crews using mule teams pulling graders and dump wagons carved out the polo field, roads and building plans.
The first ranch structure was a U-shape barn, butilt in late 1925, to house the mule teams.
“When we first came out here, the first thing they built was that little barn,” Jim Rogers was quoted as saying in a 1976 interview.
Photos show a board and batten structure with tarpaper roof and courtyard with concrete wash racks. By 1928 most of the mules had been replaced by Will’s recreation horses and he had a fancy new barn on the property.
According to Jim, who represented the family on the Will Rogers Memorial Commission , one of Will’s horses speeded up the decision to reconfigure the hay barn in 1928. A horse pulled back and “jerked about half the roof down and then we had to tear part of it down,” he said.
The barn became a bunkhouse and two wings were torn down to be turned into other structures.
Young said it has been difficult, if not impossible, to tell where the lumber went. “Jim said you would have to say, ‘Well how was it on Monday? Because by Wednesday it was entirely different,’” Young said, in working to return the ranch to the way it looked in 1935.
Lumber was recycled into a carpenter’s shop and hay barn and all over the ranch.
Jim now had the lumber to build his own stables and enlisted Buddy Sterling, his friend and ranch hand. They “cobbled” together a building his father referred to as the “mule barn,” Young said.
Jim did keep his horses there. But since he was away at school and didn’t have time to ride and play polo, his father used the barn for other horses.
In 1932 when the Olympics were hosted by Los Angeles, private ranches were used to board horses of international equestrian teams. The Santa Monica Ranch and “Jim’s Barn” was used by the Japanese Olympic team.
During the war years, 1941-44, Young said several structures were moved from the property. Between the time an audit was done in 1942 and the state of California took title to the property in June 1944, “Jim’s Barn” was removed.
While Jim didn’t remember why, Young said, a community story is that a relative of Will’s needed to build a house in Santa Monica Canyon. It was during the war years and lumber was impossible to get for building a house. Betty Rogers offered to give or sell the old mule barn for the house, which was disassembled and rebuilt for the relative.
There is record of a permit to move a structure issued to a Charles Roger in 1943.
“I have measured the lumber in this structure and it is consistent with the board width of the bunkhouse wood,” Young said.
Early photos indicate the barn area was a glass greenhouse and lathhouse. During the last two years of Betty Rogers’ life, Ekkes Nursery, a prominent horticulture firm, rented from Betty and had a large poinsettia facility.
In the 1960s, changes were made for a large equestrian operation that had grown around the site. A small trail was graded over the historic site and soil pushed into the historic footprint of the barn.
Clearing the site of structures built during the park era “was the first order of business” in the reconstruction process, Young said. The 1970s-era lathhouse and 1960s-era tack sheds occupied the historic footprint.
After determining the historic grade and orientation — using a 1940s aerial, the location was fixed.
Jim Rogers’ son, Chuck, who represents the family working on the restoration, drove the first nail on the barn restoration. Chuck, who lives in Arizona, will be in Claremore for the 125th anniversary celebration of Will Rogers' birth.
(Note: Information in this story was provided by Randall Young, associated with renovation and reconstruction of the Santa Monica ranch. He is planning to come to Claremore for this year’s Will Rogers Days celebration)