lived in the bunk house (today's administration building) until his eviction and 

 subsequent hiring by the federal government. 177 



In the late 1950s, the ranch became a focal point in the establishment of 

 Point Reyes National Seashore, being part of the smaller, original park plan. 

 The National Park Service rented a building from the Kelhams to operate their 

 land office, and a tiny parcel on the coastal part of the ranch became the first 

 property to be deeded to the new park, as the gravesite of park legislation 

 sponsor Clem Miller. The National Park Service purchased Bear Valley ranch 

 on October 1, 1963, for $5,725,000. National Seashore staff immediately moved 

 into the ranch buildings, with the bunkhouse and dairy foreman's house used as 

 administration buildings. A wing was added to the bunkhouse in the late 1960s. 

 The horse barn is used by the rangers as an office and fire cache. The garage 

 and equipment shop are used by the park maintenance division. The foreman's 

 house, the upper apartment and garage, and Rapp's 1923 house were put to use 

 as park housing. The upper horse barn now houses a part of the National 

 Seashore's well-known Morgan Horse Ranch. The park service built a picnic 

 area and parking lot in a meadow at the foot of the road to the Rapp house. 178 



A number of water systems had been in use on the ranch for many years. 

 A major system on a tributary of Bear Valley Creek supplied Olema with water, 

 apparently since before the turn of the century. Another system, also feeding 

 the Olema network, was located above the tributary of the creek that passes 

 behind Rule Loklo, the park's Coast Miwok interpretive area. It was apparently 

 built by Compton during the 1940s. The Olema system was superseded in the 

 1960s by the North Marin Water District which provided water originating in 

 Lagunitas Creek aquifers near Point Reyes Station through a pipeline from that 

 town; the Bear Valley Creek water works were removed although the other 

 system remains in an operative state near Rule Loklo, supplying water for the 

 Park's landscaping and Morgan Horse Ranch. 



In 1983 the new Bear Valley Visitor Center was completed in a meadow 

 opposite the picnic ground. Two years later, new access road was built, causing 

 the abandonment of a portion of the century-old access road to Bear Valley. 

 Today, the Bear Valley Ranch site is the primary destination of some two 

 million visitors annually to Point Reyes National Seashore. 



'"interview with George DeMartini. 

 178 Baywood Press. December 19, 1963, p. 1. 



304 



