The Ortega/Price Adobe

José Ortega was granted a two-square league rancho in 1840. José Ortega sold Rancho Pismo to Isaac Sparks in 1846.

In 1850, Sparks resold Rancho Pismo. He sold the southern half (now Grover Beach and Arroyo Grande) to Francis Ziba Branch. He sold the northern half (now Shell Beach and Pismo Beach) to John Price.

John and Andrea Price moved their family into the one-room adobe that had been built by Jose Ortega in 1840.

A second 2-room adobe was built parallel to it, by either Ortega or Price. Price enclosed the adobes and the space between them in a wood frame house with three gables and a fireplace with a brick chimney. Children’s bedrooms occupied the upstairs gabled rooms.

In 1856 he built a two-story adobe next to the house, hired a school teacher, and had a school in the upstairs room of the two-story adobe.

The two-story schoolhouse adobe collapsed sometime after 1970, and in 1989 fire destroyed the wooden portion of the tri-gable adobe complex.

What remains of the adobe is located adjacent to Price Anniversary House but is separated by a property line and the city-county boundary. Friends of Price House and the City of Pismo Beach hope to add the historic adobe site to Price Historical Park.