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PORT HARFORD, OR SAN LUIS BAY 



MYRON ANGBL and L. E. BLOCHM AN 



SAN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY has about ninety miles of ocean front- 

 age, along which are several fairly good landings and one excellent 

 harbor. These have been used in commerce ever since ships first 

 sailed along the coast, — in fact, were visited and named by Cabrillo in 

 1542. The bay of San Luis he named Todos Santos, or "All Saints' 

 Bay"; this was later named Port Harford, and quite recently is being called 

 San Luis Bay. 



There are wharves at San Simeon, Cayucos, Moro, Port Harford, Oilport, 

 and La Grande Beach. Port Harford wharf is owned by the Pacific Coast 

 Steamship Company, the Oilport wharf by the California Petroleum Re- 

 fineries Company, and the one at La Grande Beach by a pleasure resort 

 company. The last three are on San Luis Bay, or Port Harford. This fine 

 harbor is formed by an incurve of the coast from Point San Luis on the 

 north to Point Sal on the south. The middle shore forms the famous Pizmo 

 Beach. This well-known pleasure resort is fourteen miles in length. It is 

 reached by the Southern Pacific Railroad at Pizmo and Oceano stations. 

 High hills protect this incurving bay from the northwest winds and currents. 

 From Point San Luis the National Government is constructing a break- 

 water, now extending southerly about half a mile. When the extension 

 is completed according to the plans of Colonel Benyaurd, it will make a 

 perfect harbor for safety and accessibility. The protected water will then 

 have a surface of about four square miles, and somewhat over three miles 

 of wharf frontage. A south wall was included in the plans of Colonel Ben- 

 yaurd to protect landing-places south of Oilport. The growing business of 

 the future will demand the larger harbor which the great engineer designed. 

 In the early history of the State, prior to the construction of the South- 

 ern Pacific through the San Joaquin Valley, much of the trade of that 

 region as far north as Merced came to San Luis harbor and then crossed 

 the Coast Range to its destination by easy passes. Pipe-lines for carrying 

 crude oil from the interior to this port have been surveyed across some of 

 these passes. 



Port Harford wharf, through its connecting narrow-gauge railroad, is 

 the shipping point of most of the produce of northern Santa Barbara County, 

 including the Santa Maria, Los Alamos, and Los Olivos valleys, and also of 

 the nearer-by southern and western parts of San Luis Obispo County. The 

 Arroyo Grande oil wells will before another year be adding to the present 

 production of oil, with the amount increasing as new wells are bored. Heavy 

 shipments of grain, barley, and oats, of beans, and of poultry and dairy 

 produce are made from this wharf. But the growing commercial importance 

 of this port to-day Is due to the enormous oil shipments that come to it 

 through several pipe-lines from the Santa Maria oil fields. Three pipe-lines 

 reach the wharf, tv/o of the Union Oil Company, and one of the Standard. 

 Each of these companies has a fleet of vessels that load here and distribute 

 their oil cargoes along the coast and abroad. Over half a million barrels of 

 oil are shipped monthly from this wharf. The California Petroleum Re- 

 fineries Company will soon be shipping a quarter of a million barrels monthly 

 from the Oilport wharf. The Standard and the Union Oil Companies have 

 large tankage reservoirs on the near-by shore; the Union has in addition a 

 simple refinery for topping the crude oil from the Santa Maria field. The 

 California Petroleum Refineries Company has recently completed an ex- 

 tensive and up-to-date refining plant at Oilport. All grades of oil are dis- 

 tilled from the crude oil piped from the Santa Maria fields; coal-oil, dis- 

 tillates, gasolines, benzine, naphtha, engine and other lubricating oils are 

 some of the refined products. 



