Last painting of 2019, Barboni Ranch, Hick’s Valley, West Marin. 8x10” acrylic.

Last painting of the year. Barboni Ranch, Hick’s Valley, West Marin. 8x10” acrylic. The iconic tree and rock formation is just past the one-room Lincoln schoolhouse with the vernal pool nestled in the lower foothills of Hick’s Mountain. Eponymous Tennessee land baron “Uncle Billy” Hicks never lived in the valley, once part of the Rancho Corte Madera de Novato land grant, that was named after him. Arroyo Sausal fireroad is to the right. It might be on one of the Barberoni ranches, preserved by MALT. Maybe Circle B Ranch? The Barbonis were Italian-Swiss, like most of the West Marin ranchers who settled there in the 1880s. Barboni founded Marin Dell Milk. I remember seeing the sign as a kid. Biggest ranches in Marin, 2600 acres, total, now preserved. Lots of rare and endangered species on that ranch including white buttercups in the lone remaining vernal pool, and home to red-legged frogs, badgers, otter.

Hicks Valley, Mountain: An absentee landlord in Marin's early days, William Hicks, left his name with this valley in the ranching area of Marin. (The Marin French Cheese Factory is located here.) Hicks was a native of Tennessee who arrived in California in 1843 and amassed a land empire. In the words of a newspaper reporter in 1884, "His acres, horses and cattle covered a thousand hills." The land stretched over Sacramento, San Joaquin, Stanislaus and Sonoma Counties, plus Marin, where in 1855 he bought 4,000 plus acres of Rancho Corte de Madera del Novato for $5,000. "Uncle Billy" Hicks died in 1884 at the age of 67 at his home in Hicksville, Sacramento County, a town no longer in existence. There was a post office named Hicksville, 1860-1889. —Place Names of Marin, by Louise Teather, 1986page 29

Neighboring Thompson Ranch, aka Marin French Cheese factory. Illinois 49er, well 65er, he came late—Jefferson  Thompson built an empire on cheese, supplying buttermilk cheese to the saloons of San Francisco. He wasn’t  French, his children changed the name to  “Rouge et Noir” to make it sound classy. After three generations, the Cheese Factory was sold to Jim Boyce, of Bishop, Ca. When Boyce died in 2010, it was sold to a French family business, Rians. It’s the oldest continuously operating cheese factory in the United States—and bona fide French after 150 years.

1/1/2020

I made a pastel too, 9 x 12” but I don’t like it very much. I need six solid pieces of art by Jan 9, for two upcoming art shows. The pressure’s on.

Rancho Corte Madera de Novato
Rancho Corte Madera de Novato was a 8,879-acre (35.93 km2) Mexican land grant in Marin County, California given in 1839 by Governor Juan Alvarado to John Martin. The name means the "lumber mill of Novato". The grant extended along Hicks Valley north west of present day Novato.
Englishman John (Juan) Martin (1787–1860) came to Yerba Buena in 1822, on the "Orion" (which also brought William A. Richardson). In 1826, Martin married Maria Tomasa Antonia Dominga Cantua, and settled at the Presidio of San Francisco. By 1832, he was farming near Sonoma. In 1837 he moved to Corte Madera de Novato where he was granted two square leagues in 1840. He lived there with his wife and the families of his children.
With the cession of California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. As required by the Land Act of 1851, a claim for Rancho Corte Madera de Novato was filed with the Public Land Commission in 1852, and the grant was patented to John Martin in 1863.
In 1852, Martin sold one square mile of the rancho to their daughter, Loretta and her husband, George Brewer. At the same time they granted another square mile to Loretta alone. In 1853, George Brewer, tried to have John Martin declared mentally incompetent, but lost the court case, and Martin began to divest himself of his land holdings. Brewer died in 1853, and Martin and Tomasa lived with Loretta. John Martin was dead by 1860, and Tomasa married Manuel Barra.
In 1855, William ("Uncle Billy") Hicks (1817–1884), who came to California with the Chiles-Walker party in 1843, bought 4,000 acres (16.2 km2) of Rancho Corte Madera de Novato. He was an absentee landlord, living on Rancho Sanjon de los Moquelumnes, but Hicks Valley, and Hicks Mountain are named for him. —Wiki