Rancho El Sur was a Mexican land grant in present-day Monterey County, California on the Big Sur coast given in 1834 by Governor José Figueroa to Juan Bautista Alvarado. The grant extended from the mouth of Little Sur River inland about 2.5 miles (4.0 km) over the coastal mountains and south along the coast past the mouth of the Big Sur River to Cooper's Point. In about 1892, the rancho land plus an additional of resale homestead land was divided into two major parcels. The southern became the Molera Ranch, later the foundation of Andrew Molera State Park. The northern form the present-day El Sur Ranch.
History
Before the arrival of Europeans, the land was occupied by the Esselen people, who resided along the upper Carmel and Arroyo Seco Rivers, and along the Big Sur coast from near present-day Hurricane Point to the vicinity of Vicente Creek in the south. The native people were heavily affected by the establishment of three Spanish Missions near them from 1770 to 1791. The native population was decimated by disease, including measles, smallpox, and syphilis, which wiped out 90 percent of the native population, and by conscript labor, poor food, and forced assimilation. Most of the Esselen people's villages within the current Los Padres National Forest were left largely uninhabited.
Spanish grant
Alvarado filed a claim for Rancho El Sur on May 14, 1834 in which he stated that he had first petitioned for a provisional grant on August 12, 1830, and repeated his petition on February 26, 1831. He stated that he maintained "at this time ... more than three hundred head of large cattle and nearly an[sic] hundred horses, all my own property, and have built a house and pens."
Mexican Governor José Figueroa granted Rancho El Sur comprising two square leagues of land () on the Big Sur coast to Juan Bautista Alvarado (1809 -1882) in 1834. Cooper was apparently involved in managing the ranch as early as 1834, when he negotiated an agreement with Job Dye to permit him to raise mules on the property.
In 1840, Alvarado traded ownership of Rancho El Sur to Captain John B. R. Cooper in exchange for the more accessible and readily farmed Rancho Bolsa del Potrero y Moro Cojo north of present-day Castroville in the Salinas Valley.
When Mexico ceded California to the United States following the Mexican-American War, the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo provided that the land grants would be honored. But California passed the Land Act of 1851, which required grantees to provide legal proof of their title. Cooper filed a claim for Rancho El Sur with the Public Land Commission in 1852 and he received the legal land patent after years of litigation in 1866.
Cooper never actually lived at the ranch, but various family members and ranch workers continuously occupied it from 1840 onward. In the 1850s Cooper landed smuggled goods at the mouth of Big Sur River to avoid the heavy customs charges levied by the Americans at Monterey.
Next generation
On March 12, 1871, John B.R. Cooper's 40 year old son John B.H. married 18 year old Martha Brawley, a cousin of Abraham Lincoln, at the San Carlos Cathedral. After John B.R. Cooper's death in 1872, the ranch was divided into four parts: son John B.H. Cooper received the northern-most section. John B.R. Cooper's widow Maria Encarnación Vallejo received section two of the land. Their two surviving daughters, Anna Maria de Guadalupe Cooper and Francisca Guadalupe Amelia Cooper, received sections three and four.
John B.H. Cooper became a Monterey County supervisor and managed Rancho Bolsa del Potrero y Moro Cojo between present-day Castroville and Tembladero Slough. He later moved to San Francisco while continuing to own the ranch. J.B.H. Cooper and his wife Martha had four children: Alice, John, Abelarde, and Alfred. J.B.H. built a new home on Rancho El Sur for his family but died on June 21, 1899, soon after its completion, and before he could live there. Martha Brawley Cooper received of her husband's estate. By 1904, she had added to her share of the ranch.
After her son Alfred died in an automobile accident on September 2, 1913, his two siblings assigned their interest in the estate including his share of the Rancho to their mother, Martha.
Molera Ranch
John B. H. Cooper's sister Francisca Amelia married Eusebius J. Molera, an engineer and architect born in Spain, on March 28, 1876, in Vallejo, California. She retained her share of the rancho she inherited from her parents. The marriage between the Cooper and Molera families left a legacy marked by their names on notable places throughout the region, including the Cooper-Molera Adobe in Monterey.