One of the oldest Spanish structures in southern California is an adobe in Long Beach. It was built in 1804 on a working ranch known as Rancho Los Alamitos.

Pamela Seager says, "Rancho Los Alamitos means Ranch of the Little Cottonwoods. And so it was named because of the cottonwoods that grow in the riparian areas because there was water."

Seager is executive director of the Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation. She says the cottonwoods were the only trees around. There wasn't extra lumber to put up corrals, so the adobe at the Rancho was used as a cattle pen and a bunkhouse for the vaqueros.

The main ranch house was about 20 miles to the north in what's now Whittier, too far away for the vaqueros to make back before the sun went down. So instead, the cowboys and the cows would spend the night in the adobe among the cottonwoods.

(Airdate: 2/15/2009)