Before this became the Knox home, it was a hotel for miners, drovers and stagecoach travelers going to and from the Julian gold strike. The Historical Society has furnished the building to represent what settlers  brought with them from back East and Europe to live on San Diego’s frontier between the years 1869 and 1912. The master bedroom set was brought here by Illa -- most likely with her first husband, who died from tuberculosis shortly after they arrived.

 

So, why in 1876, would anyone build a small-windowed, weather-tight Victorian farmhouse in hot Southern California?

What do the books, magazines and organ in the parlor tell you about Amaziah and Illa Knox?

What do the children’s toys and books tell you about the parenting of their two youngest children?

What do the foods in the kitchen tell you about the state of Americans’ health around the turn of the 19^th Century?

How do those foods differ from what Americans had been eating prior to the health fears and governmental intervention of the early 1900s?  

Can you even imagine early settlers pushing the perambulator along the village/town’s unpaved streets and paths?

What’s missing from the house?