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Saturday 1pm - 4pm Sunday 1pm - 4pm

Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society

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Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society

The Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society is a non-profit 501(c)(3) volunteer organization dedicate The museum is open from 1-4 p.m. every Saturday and Sunday.

Heritage Junction Historic Park
See Heritage Junction http://www.scvhs.org/hjsitemap.htm

The Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society (SCVHS) provides a community repository and open resource to access our valleys and the surrounding regions history. The Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society cares for 7 Historic buildings and one Mogul Steam locomotive on the grounds of approximately 4 acres at

Heritage Junction Historic Park. In addition, we are the caretakers of over 15,000 historical artifacts including books, photos & antiquities, from our rich history in the SCV. The collection spans over 5000 years from the original Indians through many significant events in our nation’s history. The SCV Historical Society serves thousands of people and students each year learning about our history, culture, traditions, science, technology, land use, and diversity using the SCVHS collections and resources. To further its objective of education, the Society maintains a museum of local history, provides guest speakers for clubs and school groups, gives tours of its Heritage Junction Historic Park and holds public meetings monthly with a speaker of general historic interest. Exhibits include memorabilia from downtown Newhall's heyday, the pioneer oil and mining industries, the railroad and the discovery of gold in Placerita Canyon. The fledgling movie industry is also celebrated with items from early cowboy and silent movie stars on display. Docents are available to answer questions about the museum, the Junction, and local points of historical interest

06/15/2026

At home in Brentwood in 2006, James Arness talks about how John Wayne recommended him for the role of Matt Dillon after declining Gunsmoke himself, and how Wayne introduced the first episode in 1955. He remembers filming the early outdoor scenes at Melody Ranch in Placerita Canyon, when the Santa Clarita Valley was still open country and Western crews could shoot in nearly any direction without seeing houses, telephone poles or modern development.

James Arness spent 20 years as Marshal Matt Dillon on Gunsmoke, but...

06/01/2026

Click the image to watch ... In this episode of Points of Interest, Philip Scorza travels from the Cascades in present-day Sylmar to the Owens Valley with Dr. Alan Pollack and Dianne Erskine-Hellrigel of the Santa Clarita Valley Historical Society. Together they trace the story behind the Water Wars: aqueduct bombings, the seizure of the Alabama Gates, the kidnapping of L.C. Hall, the Watterson brothers, the collapse of local banks, and the fight over whether Los Angeles was saving itself or destroying an entire valley.

Before Los Angeles became a modern metropolis, it needed water. Tha...

05/27/2026

Click the image to watch ... "Points of Interest" host Philip Scorza follows the old Southern Pacific right-of-way from the Saugus Train Station at William S. Hart Park to Santa Paula, with stops along the route to look at bridges, surviving rail features, former station sites, cattle pens and railroad equipment. The program includes a remarkable historic film clip of a Southern Pacific cab-forward steam locomotive barreling through Saugus in the late 1930s or early 1940s and snatching a U.S. Mail pouch from a mail catcher post.

The Santa Paula branch line of the Southern Pacific Railroad once connected Saugus, Piru, Fillmore and Santa Paula, carrying passengers, freight, citrus prod...

05/24/2026

Science fiction author Ray Bradbury reflects on Mars, space exploration, science fiction, education, technology and the future in this rare 2003 SCV Newsmaker of the Week interview. Recorded on Bradbury's 83rd birthday, the conversation came at a historic moment: Mars was making its closest approach to Earth in tens of thousands of years, and NASA's Spirit and Opportunity rovers were already on their way to the Red Planet. For Santa Clarita, the mission had a local connection: many engineers and scientists tied to JPL's Mars program live in the Santa Clarita Valley.

Ray Bradbury, one of the great imaginative voices of the 20th century, reflects on Mars, space exploration, science fiction, education, technology and the fu...

05/23/2026

Click the image to view this episode of Philip Scorza's Points of Interest. The Santa Clara River begins in the mountains above Acton and winds west through Soledad Canyon before reaching Santa Clarita -- a mostly wild river corridor that shaped the railroads, roads, settlements, wildlife habitat and open space of northern Los Angeles County.

The Santa Clara River begins in the mountains above Acton and winds...

05/20/2026

Click the image to watch the video .... Gene Ruddell was 5 years old when the St. Francis Dam collapsed. Seated beside an actual chunk of concrete from the dam, Gene recalls his father's work at Southern California Edison hydro plants and the warning signs his father saw before the dam collapsed in 1928 -- muddy water, failing communication lines and the sudden realization that a wall of water was moving down San Francisquito Canyon toward Saugus, Santa Paula and the Pacific Ocean.

The conversation also follows Gene and MaryLou's arrival in Sand Canyon in 1951, when the Crocker Ranch still operated as cattle land and the surrounding area was open country. They describe early ranching life, the rules and routines of working for the Crockers, the schools their children attended, neighbors in Sand Canyon and Placerita Canyon, and the gradual transformation of the valley into suburban Santa Clarita.

In this episode of Legacy: Santa Clarita's Living History, Gene and...

05/19/2026

Click the image to watch .... In this episode of SCV In the Movies, hosts E.J. Stephens and Bill West look past the plot and focus on where the picture was made, who made it, and why it connects to the Santa Clarita Valley. They point out the Placerita Canyon locations at Trem Carr Ranch, now part of Disney's Golden Oak Ranch, where the Western town and hacienda scenes were filmed. They also discuss Walker Ranch, the cabin associated with Frank Walker, and the surviving Walker cabin at the Placerita Nature Center. The episode also follows the film north to Lone Pine, where the Eastern Sierra and Alabama Hills provide the snow-capped mountains and rounded rock formations that stand apart from the Santa Clarita locations.

John Wayne rides through Santa Clarita and Lone Pine in Blue Steel, a 1934 Lone Star Western with deep Southern California movie-location ties.Key Moments (H...

05/18/2026

Click the image to view .... U.S. Marine Corps veteran and SCV resident Chuck Greene recalls serving aboard aircraft carriers during the Vietnam War, maintaining A-4 Skyhawk aircraft and working close to the daily danger of Pacific flight deck operations.

U.S. Marine Corps veteran Chuck Greene recalls serving aboard aircraft carriers during the Vietnam War, maintaining A-4 Skyhawk aircraft and working close to...

05/17/2026

Click the image to watch the video

Mike Corralejo was 14 years old when he helped search for bodies after the St. Francis Dam failed above Saugus on March 12, 1928, sending a wall of water down the Santa Clara River Valley toward the Pacific Ocean.

Mike Corralejo was 14 years old when he helped search for bodies after the St. Francis Dam failed above Saugus on March 12, 1928, sending a wall of water dow...

05/15/2026

Click the image to watch the video ... Warner Bros. began not as a Hollywood empire, but as four brothers from an immigrant family who turned nickelodeons, film exchanges, sound technology and high-risk gambles into one of the defining studios in American movie history. In this presentation, Hollywood historian E.J. Stephens traces the rise of Harry, Albert, Sam and Jack Warner from their early showings of The Great Train Robbery to the Cascade Theater, the Sunset Boulevard studio, Vitaphone, The Jazz Singer, First National, the Burbank lot and the films that helped shape the sound era, gangster pictures, musicals, wartime Hollywood and the modern studio system.

Warner Bros. began not as a Hollywood empire, but as four brothers from an immigrant family who turned nickelodeons, film exchanges, sound technology and hig...

Address

24101 Newhall Avenue , PO Box 221925
Santa Clarita, CA
91321

Opening Hours

Saturday	1pm - 4pm
Sunday	1pm - 4pm

Website

https://scvhs.org/

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