By Kevin Newhouse
One of the oldest and most historically significant buildings still standing in Aptos today is the Bay View Hotel. The beautifully constructed hotel was completed in 1878 and is one of the few remaining links to the original town. Although the Bay View was built very early in the town’s development, it was not the first hotel in Aptos. That honor goes to The Live Oak House.
The hotel’s founder, Patrick Walsh was a rough character. He was a criminal, a slave owner, and refused to comply with the law if it didn’t suit him. His life began and ended with acts of civil disobedience.
Walsh was born in Ireland on March 17, 1832. At the age of 13, he was caught stealing a salmon. After being punished by both the schoolmaster and his father, he ran away from home. He reached the sea, gave his age as 17, and signed up as a deck hand on a mail ship to Liverpool. After arriving, Walsh found a job in the railroad industry. Starting out polishing locomotives, he eventually worked his way up to mechanic, fireman, and finally, an engine driver. At the age of 21, Walsh went to work for an American railroad and became an engineer on a train out of St. Joseph, Missouri. He bought a farm and married a young Canadian woman named Catherine.
During the Civil War, Walsh was a lieutenant in a private regiment for the Confederacy called the Emmet Guards. He was captured as Vicksburg fell but because his skills as an engineer were needed for reconstruction in the South, he was released after being held only briefly. It was around this time that stories about opportunities in California started surfacing from relatives who traveled west to Aptos by wagon train. Even though Aptos was still a very young, undeveloped town, Patrick and Catherine decided to join their relatives. They bought a piece of land between Aptos and Valencia Creeks where they built a house that still exists today as a private residence. They planted a farm and built a hotel about 50-yards west from their home along Coast Road (today’s Soquel Drive).
The two-story hotel was opened for business in 1869. The first floor of the Live Oak House included a lobby, dining room, and kitchen facilities. The second floor was equipped with 12 sleeping rooms. Patrick Walsh also built a saloon adjacent to the hotel, which would later be known as “The Aptos Club.”
The saloon would prove to be Walsh’s most profitable venture, as it was a popular hangout for lumbermen, tannery workers, stage drivers and travelers.
Despite competition from Claus Spreckels’ Aptos Hotel (1875) and the Arano Family’s Bay View Hotel (1878), the Live Oak House successfully operated as a hotel until 1910… one year after Catherine passed away. Patrick, however, would continue to operate The Aptos Club as a tavern and card room, even when he was told to stop serving alcohol.
In November 1912, even before the days of prohibition (1920-1933), The Soquel District had voted itself “dry” under the local option law. Walsh did not comply. Walsh’s grandnephew, the late Vincent T Leonard recalled his “Uncle Pat” saying something along the lines of, “I’ve run a decent business for 50-years, and no sissy psalm-singers are going to drive me out”. He was given several warnings and was arrested multiple times. He was acquitted by the justice court in the Aptos district but in 1916 was indicted by the district prosecuting attorney and was found guilty, making him the oldest man at this time (84 years old) to appear for sentencing in a California Court. Walsh, unwilling to pay the $300 fine, was ordered to serve his time in the Santa Cruz Jail.
Walsh was released from jail, went home, and despite all he had gone through, opened his saloon. Over the next few years, Walsh would continue to defy authority and was eventually sentenced to 90 days but was judged “incompetent.”
He was released into the care of his niece, Clara Leonard, who kept a close watch on him. Walsh passed away in his sleep on February 27, 1927, at the age of 94.
The Aptos Club continued to operate in the Live Oak House until 1966, when the last remnants of the town’s first hotel were dismantled. A gas station was built in the hotel’s location (Driftwood Gas Station, which became Mohawk Gas, and then later Terrible Herbst Service Station). After the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989, the property fell into disarray and was eventually demolished. Today, Bay Federal Credit Union occupies the location.
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For more information about the Aptos History Museum, upcoming events, or becoming a member of the museum, please visit www.aptoshistory.org.
