Point Fermin is the site of a historic lighthouse at the southernmost tip of the Palos Verdes Peninsula in San Pedro, about 25 miles (40km) southeast of Santa Monica and 7 miles (11km) southwest of Long Beach, California. The point is named after Father Fermín de Lasuén, who in 1792 met British explorer George Vancouver at the Carmel Mission near Monterey. When Vancouver sailed into San Pedro Bay the following year, he named Point Fermin and Point Lasuen in the father’s honor. The point is formed by sea cliffs of Point Fermin Sandstone, which developed during the Miocene epoch (about 23 million to 5 million years ago) as a submarine fan in the Monterey Formation. That formation is the principal source-rock for oil in California and is thought to hold 84% of known oil reserves in the San Joaquin Basin—some 12.2 billion barrels. Monterey Formation oil was first discovered at the Orcutt oil field in the Santa Maria Basin of Santa Barbara County in 1901, followed by the Cat Canyon and Lompoc oil fields nearby. Major offshore discoveries followed, including the South Ellwood field in the Santa Barbara Channel and the Point Arguello field in the Santa Maria Basin. Early production depended on natural fractures in the rock, though steam injection and hydraulic fracturing are increasingly used today.

The Palos Verdes Peninsula is the traditional territory of the Tongva people and the site of a village called Chowigna that was inhabited for at least 7,100 years and first recorded by the Cabrillo Expedition in 1542. The Tongva were a semi-nomadic coastal hunter-gatherer people whose territory covered nearly 2,560,000 acres (1,036,000ha), including the islands of Santa Catalina and San Clemente, part of Orange County, and most of present-day Los Angeles County—lands that sustained a population of nearly 5,000. They traveled on foot and by canoe; their vessels, called ti’ats, could hold 15 people and were built from large wooden planks, giving the Tongva access to fish, shellfish, and sea mammals, which they also traded with inland neighbors. The peninsula formed part of a 75,000-acre (30,351ha) Spanish land grant, Rancho San Pedro, awarded to Juan José Domínguez in 1784. After Mexican independence in 1821, part of that grant was contested, and in 1846 Governor Pío Pico issued a new grant—Rancho de los Palos Verdes, 31,629 acres (12,800ha)—to José Loreto and Juan Capistrano Sepulveda. By 1882 the land had been divided into 17 parcels and passed, through various mortgage holders, to Jotham Bixby of Rancho Los Cerritos, who leased it to Japanese farmers. After the turn of the century, most of Bixby’s holdings were sold to a consortium of New York investors led by Frank A. Vanderlip, who launched the Palos Verdes Project and marketed the land for horse ranches and residential communities.

The Point Fermin Lighthouse was designed by Paul J. Pelz and built in 1874 to mark the harbor at San Pedro, which served a rapidly growing Los Angeles region connected to the bay by the Los Angeles and San Pedro Railroad in 1869. Materials including redwood and fir were delivered by ship. The ornate Victorian structure, which combines the light tower and keeper’s residence, is similar in design to the original Port Hueneme Lighthouse and the Hereford Inlet Lighthouse in New Jersey. The light was electrified and managed by the City of Los Angeles from 1927; it remained active until December 9, 1941—two days after Pearl Harbor—when west coast lights were extinguished to deny navigational aid to Japanese submarines. Saved from demolition in 1972 and refurbished in 1974, the lighthouse was listed on the National Register of Historic Places that same year, and a new lantern room and gallery were added by local preservationists. In 2002 it was restored, retrofitted, and made accessible to the public with funding from the City of Los Angeles, the Port of Los Angeles, and the State of California. It opened to visitors on November 1, 2003, under the City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks, with volunteers from the Point Fermin Lighthouse Society serving as tour guides. Read more here and here. Explore more of Point Fermin and San Pedro here: