Sense of Place: How Taylor Mountain got its name

Taylor Mountain, which rises above the Sonoma County Fairgrounds just southeast of Santa Rosa, takes its name from John Shackleford Taylor. A Virginian by birth, Taylor came west by wagon train. After mining gold in the Sierras, he settled at the foot of his mountain in 1853, when Santa Rosa was still a tiny village.

Taylor was an industrious man. He raised sheep and cattle, planted one of the first vineyards in the area and mined a low-grade coal seam that ran through his mountain, delivering the fuel to town by donkey train.

Many of Taylor’s neighbors were southern sympathizers from states like Missouri, Tennessee and Kentucky. Most of them were Democrats, political conservatives who supported states’ rights. (Abraham Lincoln was Republican and never did win the local vote for president.)

In 1857, when Alpheus Russell began talking about starting up a newspaper with a Democratic viewpoint, Taylor handed him a $5 gold piece and became the Sonoma Democrat’s first subscriber.

Taylor’s property was most famous for its mineral spring. In 1862, he built a hotel and launched one of the county’s first health spas, the White Sulphur Springs Resort (later called Kawana Springs).

Guests bathed in heated mineral waters, played croquet and drank straight from one of the smelly, sulfurous springs. After trains arrived in the 1870s, guests were picked up at the Railroad Square depot and taken by buggy to the resort.

Taylor also was a founder of the Santa Rosa Bank, ran unsuccessfully for public office and laid out the area’s first horse track, a half-mile oval called “Taylor’s Driving Park.” Just a half mile south of the current Fairgrounds track, it was used for some of the early county fairs.

The springs stopped flowing after the 1906 quake, and Taylor closed his resort. But he never let his newspaper subscription lapse, remaining a loyal reader right up until his death in 1927 at age 99. By that time it was called the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Cattle still graze on Taylor’s former ranch, though today it’s partially for fire and weed control. People still go there to improve their health and well-being. As one of our newest regional parks, Taylor Mountain welcomes the public for outdoor recreation (http://parks.sonomacounty.ca.gov).

And though the Democratic and Republican parties have flip-flopped on the political spectrum, “Democrat” once again reflects the county’s electoral leaning. Without John Taylor and his $5 gold piece, the paper you’re holding might have a whole different name.

Contact Glen Ellen-based historical ecologist Arthur Dawson at baseline@vom.com.sw