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From St. Paula to Santa Paula: How our city got its name

February 04, 2005
Santa Paula News

Saint Paula’s celebration was January 26, and the patron saint of widows, hospices and hospitals is also the namesake for the City of Santa Paula.

By Peggy KellySanta Paula TimesSaint Paula’s celebration was January 26, and the patron saint of widows, hospices and hospitals is also the namesake for the City of Santa Paula. City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz – via the city’s blog – noted the celebration of St. Paula Day and wondered how Santa Paula was named after the saint, also known as Paulina and Pauline the Widow.Born into Roman nobility on May 5, 347, Saint Paula was married to influential Roman Senator Toxotius and had five children, including Saint Eustochium and Saint Blaesilla. She was widowed at the young age of 32 in 379, and devoted her considerable fortune and the rest of her life to spiritual development and care for the poor.A friend of Saint Marcella, Saint Epiphanius and Saint Paulinus of Antioch, Saint Paula was also a friend, spiritual student and supporter of Saint Jerome – known as a difficult man - whom she met in 382. St. Jerome later wrote her biography, “Pilgrim to the Holy Lands” in 385.Saint Paula settled in Bethlehem in 396, where she built churches, a hospice, monastery and convent, and she served as its first abbess. She died in 404 in Bethlehem of natural causes, and is buried under the Church of the Nativity.
It’s a long way from Bethlehem to Santa Paula, so what was the connection?“The short answer is the city was named for the land grant,” said Mitch Stone of San Buenaventura Research. “But the official explanation is: A stock ranch called Santa Paula belonging to Mission San Buenaventura, in the heathen district Atugu, is mentioned in July 1834. The place was probably named for Saint Paula, a noble Roman matron who became a disciple of Saint Jerome. The name was applied to a land grant, Santa Paula y Saticoy, dated July 31, 1834 and April 28, 1840. The modern town was founded on the grant by Nathan W. Blanchard and E.L. Bradley in 1872.”Nathan Blanchard became a heralded founder and business leader; E. L. Bradley unfortunately died from the result of a cat bite, according to several sources.Stone notes that according to Erwin G. Gudde’s “California Place Names” published by the UC Press in 1965, the “mission fathers applied many and various religious names to places. According to Gudde, ‘The padres who accompanied these [Portola and Anza expeditions] had a rather tedious way of applying the names of the saint on or near whose day a certain place was reached.’ ” On the day the padres came into what became Santa Paula, they must have cast an eye – or even a foot – on an area to the west. The land grant – probably the short version of such flowery times - was named Rancho Santa Paula y Saticoy.